EFCC reveals source of terrorism funding in Nigeria

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has revealed that cryptocurrency is the source of terrorism funding in Nigeria.

Chairman of the anti-graft agency, Ola Olukoyede spoke during an event organised by some civil society organisations in Abuja.

He said that terrorists are using young cryptocurrency traders in Nigeria to trade to fund terrorism in the country.

The EFCC boss said some of the people who received money to trade in cryptocurrencies did not know that their financiers were sponsors of terrorism.

He added that some of the 1,146 bank accounts recently frozen by the anti-graft agency were conduits for terrorism funding.

“Some of you are aware of our activities in the area of investigating virtual currency trading and the like of cryptocurrencies.

“They are potential platforms to fund terrorism. A lot of us don’t understand that. Some of our discoveries during the investigation of some of these platforms were mind-boggling.

“We thought Binance was a major one. Yes, it was. We are prosecuting them. But there are other platforms we have discovered.

“They used some of these young men. Some of them don’t know that the people who gave them money to trade are people who fund terrorism.”

The EFCC boss said there was a need to adopt technology in tracking money used to fund terrorism in the country.