ISC2’s 2023 Cybersecurity Workforce Study estimated that South Africa had around 57,000 cybersecurity professionals, compared with about 8,000 in Nigeria.
INTERPOL’s 2026 assessment shows just how uneven cybersecurity capacity remains across Africa.
Most importantly, cybersecurity needs to be built into digital infrastructure from the outset.
Across Africa, governments and regional institutions increasingly treat digital identity, payments, data exchange, and other digital public infrastructure as foundational systems for economic development and public services.
Cybersecurity capacity needs to be understood in the same terms.