The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) has advised candidates who wrote this year’s Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) to guard their profile code and registration details well.
The board said unscrupulous individuals were on the prowl to dupe unsuspecting candidates.
JAMB’s Head of Information, Dr. Fabian Benjamin, gave the advice yesterday in Abuja, the nation’s capital.
He also said the board had secured conviction of three persons who were arrested for impersonation during the examination.
Benjamin said the board discovered that some fraudsters were using candidates’ registration numbers to access their information, thereby using it to defraud the candidates.
According to him, once unauthorised persons with dubious intension have access to the profile code or registration of any candidate, it can be used to do “many things to the candidate”.
He said: “We have discovered that some of these fraudsters are using candidates’ registration numbers to have access to their information. You know you can use registration number to print examination notification and because of the public outcry that we should make it free for candidates to print from any point, they can print at home and from anywhere.
“If somebody lays hold on your registration number with your profile code, he/she can print your examination notification slip. He/she is not printing it to go and use for examination but on that notification, your phone number is there and other details.
“Once they have your phone number, they will begin to send you messages. There was a video in circulation where a man called a candidate and claimed to be a JAMB official. The impostor said he had checked his (candidate’s) result and that there was a problem with it and that he candidate should send money so that he would rectify it. If he didn’t have the phone number, he will not have had access to him (candidate).
“That is why we are saying guard your registration number and profile code jealously, like your ATM pin. This is because once an unauthorised person with dubious intent has a hold on it, they will use it to do so many things to you.”
Benjamin attributed the delay in releasing the results of April 11 UTME to the desire of the board to clean up the system. The spokesman said the results were ready and secured under the board’s custody.
He said: “Our not releasing the results is not as a result of any challenge at all. It is due largely to the fact that we want to clean up the system. Nigerians should cooperate with us, Nigerians should support us and Nigerians should even celebrate what we are doing.
“This attitude of always rushing to get results is what has led us to where we are today. We should be patient to get the right thing. The results, even if they are released that day, candidates won’t be able to do anything with them.
“We want to clean up the system to ensure that those who have been benefitting from it illegality, in 2019, we will ensure they will never benefit from such act again.