Some weeks ago, a casual online researcher stumbled on what may become a trans-continental security goldmine. She was trying to Google up information on whether it would be possible to send a file between two apps. She had only typed “can you send..” and the next thing she saw was Google Predict having top on the list “can you send money from Iran to Nigeria” as you can see here (maybe, you can try it yourself after reading through this):
Why Is This An Issue Worth Our Attention?
If you have the simplest understanding of how Google Predict works, you will realize how much of an issue this is. It means that there is a very high volume of individuals seeking to send money from Iran to Nigeria; so much that if you only type “can you send…”, you see it talking of sending money between two unlikely countries.
Yes, that’s what makes it even more of an issue: The fact that Iran and Nigeria doesn’t have a lot in common. Iran is not one of the places where you have a large population of the Nigerian diaspora. There is also not any significant bilateral or trade relationship between the two countries. Even in terms of religion, the brand of Islam dominant in both countries are not the same. So, why is there such a huge volume of online traffic seeking to send money from Iran to Nigeria?
There Were Other Strong Indications Before This
Lest it begins to appear like we are only crying wolf, there have been other strong indications that such sponsorship was going on only that those cases may not have been as obvious as the case stated above.
In July 2019, an aide to the Nigerian President had tweeted an accusation to this effect:
The tweet did not give details though. But, five months after it was made, it seemed quite justified: a group of Nigerians in Nigeria were protesting the killing of an Iranian General in Iran (allegedly by the United States). What’s the connection here? Were those protesters standing up for their paymasters? For us, it seems more than likely.
Why The Google Find Is Even More of An Issue
All the while, the indications probably pointed to a high-profile (government-involved) sponsorship of this nature from Iran. But the Google find shows that it is far more profound than that. It shows that such a sponsorship may have become a whole movement involving millions of people at personal levels.
Well, we have not made any conclusion about this. We only think that the indications are strong enough to worth serious considerations. And we would appreciate anyone who has any fact to further substantiate or lampoon our stated point of view.
TYM Travel Magazine 