On a slow, cloudy afternoon in Okpoi Gonno in Accra, a 17-year-old who calls himself Shatta lowers his eyes as he remembers the moment that changed everything.
“The reason why I stopped,” he says quietly, “was because I saw my mother cry for the first time. She looked so pitiful… begging me to tell her everything.”
He pauses, picking at his fingernails. “It was so sad.”
For nearly two years, Shatta lived a double life—one that his mother, teachers and neighbours had no idea about. Each morning, he put on his school uniform, slung his backpack over his shoulder, and waved goodbye before stepping out the door. But he never went to class.
Instead, he walked to a small yellow house at the edge of town, where four laptops waited. Inside, two older boys showed him how to turn strangers’ trust into fast money.
What happened to Shatta is no longer unusual. From Ghana’s coastal cities to the inland towns of the Central and Ashanti regions, children as young as 12 years old are being pulled into a growing underground of youth-led cybercrime; scamming, hacking, phishing, online identity theft, mobile money fraud, Ponzi schemes, and digital extortion.
It is a crisis spreading across West Africa. And it’s accelerating faster than parents, schools or law enforcement can control.
A Mother’s Collapse
In a quiet compound at Teshie, Shatta’s mother remembers the day her world “crumbled at her feet.”
Her voice breaks as she recounts the phone call from her son’s school teacher.
“He had missed a whole academic year,” she says, shaking her head in disbelief. “But every morning he dressed in his uniform and went out. So where was he going? How did I not know my own son?”
She spent months consulting pastors and pleading with him. Finally, in 2024, he confessed.
“He told me he goes to his friend’s house… they have four laptops, and they use them to scam people.”
Then came the moment she will never forget.
“I asked him, ‘How much have you made?’ He said… GHC 5,500 ($500) every week.”
She covers her face with her hands.
“And the money was at a bank—my own son had a bank account I didn’t know about.”
Her voice falls to a whisper.
“How did I fail as a mother?”
Inside the Boys’ Playbook
When Shatta finally opened up, he poured out everything he knew—every trick, every method, every scam.
What he described is a sprawling system of digital fraud that exploits Ghana’s rising youth unemployment, the soaring cost of living, and the country’s unregulated online spaces.
He explains one of the most common schemes—WhatsApp and Telegram hacking.
“Scammers find your number from group chats,” he says. “We call you and say there’s a system upgrade on WhatsApp to prevent scamming. Then we send you a code and tell you to send it back.”
He shrugs. “When you use the code we sent, we get access to your WhatsApp. We lock you out. Then we start defrauding all your contacts.”
Another method is pure curiosity exploitation.
“With Telegram, we’ll message you: ‘There are pictures of you on our website. Click to see.’ When you click—boom—we get access.”
Then there is “World Remit” doubling—the digital borrowing of the old “sakawa” tricks.
“We tell you bring 100 cedis for 1,000. Bring 200 for 2,000. When you try the small one, we say the system has rejected it, so you must add more. If you don’t, there is no refund—’Oshikabasha,’” he says, using the street slang for total loss.
And the famous data-bundle scams, “We advertise cheap bundles,” he says. “The ones with small packages—those are usually legit. But the big ones—10 gigs, 20 gigs—90% are scams. When you send the money, that’s all. You won’t see it again.”
Then he leans forward and lowers his voice.
“But the worst one is the Hubtel cashout.”
He describes it like revealing a ritual.
“You download a legit app—Hubtel. We tell you we’ll show you how to get a credit card from the internet. We send you to a website selling cards with big money inside.”
He laughs sadly.
“But the card details only show after you pay. When you pay, nothing comes. We created the website ourselves. It’s all fake.”
This is the new face of cyber fraud in Ghana—young, inventive, reckless, and dangerously good at manipulating trust.
“I’m not stopping. I make more than lawyers.”
Not everyone has had a change of heart like Shatta.
Just a few streets away, his friend Bello — a skinny 16-year-old who could easily pass for 12 — sits on a plastic chair, legs shaking with restless energy. He flashes a grin when asked whether he plans to quit.
“I am not stopping now,” he says confidently. “When Shatta came last year saying he will stop, I was like, ‘Ei? Why?’”
He chuckles.
“This job pays more than lawyers. Do you know how much we make? I’m sure I make more than you journalists—no offense.”
He says looking straight into my eyes, arms folded.
“I have no intention of going back to school. It is a waste of time. I am making real money, not learning Algebra, chale.”
In Bello’s world, school is optional, opportunity is instant, and risk feels distant.
“This isn’t just a cyber issue – it’s a national emergency”
In Accra, child protection specialist Susan Sabaa, Executive Director of the Child Research and Resource Centre, has seen the numbers rising.
“Children are fed daily images of luxury lifestyles on social media,” she says, frustration cutting through her calm tone. “There’s no guidance, no counter-narrative. We need nationwide education and support systems. This isn’t just a cyber issue – it’s a national emergency.”
To her, the problem is not simply about crime. It is about identity, belonging, and a digital world where children are taught to chase money before anything else.
“To a very large extent, Ghana already has strong laws—Act 843, Act 1038, the Criminal Offences Act. These frameworks clearly criminalise cyber fraud,” Abubakar Issaka, President of Cyber Security Experts Association says.
“But the challenge is not the law. It is implementation and awareness. Many young people do not even understand the prison terms they face if they are caught.”
“Sometimes we trace a number used in a scam, only to find that the registered owner died two years ago,” Issaka says.
“That tells you the data between the National Identification Authority and the mobile networks is not properly synchronised. Without accurate data, you cannot catch perpetrators—let alone protect minors being used by them.”
The Other Side of the Screen
While teenagers rake in quick profits, thousands of Ghanaians quietly bear the losses.
Philip Adjei, a 23-year-old in Accra, still remembers the sting of being conned online.
He was trying to buy suits for a friend’s event the next day.
“I was desperate,” he says plainly. “So I didn’t bother checking anything.”
The vendor’s WhatsApp Business page looked real enough—photos, reviews, stories, all carefully curated to build trust. Philip sent the money. He waited for a call from the supposed dispatch rider.
“After I paid, she went silent,” he recalls. “I called, texted… then realised she had blocked me.”
He sighs.
“I was very angry. Not at myself—well, maybe a little—but mostly at the person. You say you are selling something, I pay, and you don’t deliver.”
He didn’t report it.
“I only told a friend. He tried chatting with the same vendor. She noticed and didn’t mind him. These scammers are smart.”
Now, he avoids buying anything online unless a trusted person has recommended the seller.
“When I see vendors onine now, I just pass. I remove them from my page. I don’t want trouble.”
The Digital Economy that Pulled Children In
Across West Africa—Nigeria, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana—youth-driven cybercrime is exploding.
The tools are cheap. The learning is fast. The rewards are immediate.
But the consequences are long-term.
According to child protection experts, the factors feeding this crisis are layered, skyrocketing youth unemployment, economic hardship in low-income households, peer influence and digital subcultures, unregulated social media spaces, absent parental supervision, school dropout rates and glamorisation of online fraud by influencers.
“This isn’t happening because children are inherently criminal,” says Susan Sabaa. “It’s happening because they’re searching for meaning, money, and visibility in a world that has abandoned them.”
When Childhood Meets the Marketplace
At the heart of this story is a painful contradiction: these boys are still children.
They are not hardened criminals hidden in dark rooms—they are teenagers sleeping in single-room houses, caring for siblings, dreaming of big cars, scrolling TikTok for hours, and trying to survive.
For many, cybercrime is not about greed. It is about escape—escape from poverty, from shame, from obscurity.
“I used to think I was nobody,” Shatta admits. “But when I started making money… I felt powerful.”
He rubs his palms slowly.
“But then I saw my mother crying. That power vanished.”
A Risky Redemption
Today, Shatta is out of the business. He wants to return to school, though he worries about being behind. He also fears the boys he used to work with.
“Some of them don’t like that I stopped,” he says. “They think I’ll expose them.”
For his mother, the fear is different.
“Every day, I pray he won’t go back,” she says. “Sometimes the money calls them stronger than we do.”
A Generation on the Edge
The children trapped in Ghana’s cybercrime ecosystem are standing between two worlds—one digital, one real; one prosperous, one fragile.
Their futures depend on which world grips them hardest.
Experts like Susan Sabaa warn that Ghana must act quickly.
“Parents can no longer ignore what happens online,” she says. “Schools need to teach digital safety. Communities must guide their youth. If we lose this generation, the damage will echo for years.”
Back in Okpoi Gonno……
As the sun begins to set, the street lamps flicker on. Bello and his friends drift toward a kiosk selling phone accessories. Their laughter spills into the night.
Shatta watches from a distance.
“They think it’s a game,” he says softly. “They don’t see the danger.”
He pulls his hoodie tighter.
“If someone had warned me earlier… maybe things would have been different.”
Then he looks straight ahead, his expression firm.
“But I want to change now. I want people to hear my story. Maybe it will save another boy.”
In a country where childhood is increasingly lived on screens, and identities are traded like currency, his voice is a reminder:
Behind every scam is a child, and behind every child is a story, and behind every story is a nation trying not to lose its future.
This story was produced with the support of Media Monitoring Africa as part of the Isu Elihle Awards.
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