{"id":6917,"date":"2019-12-03T08:14:30","date_gmt":"2019-12-03T05:14:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=6917"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:44","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:44","slug":"whats-been-done-to-fight-cybercrime-in-east-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/12\/03\/whats-been-done-to-fight-cybercrime-in-east-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s Been Done To Fight Cybercrime In East Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>By\nMercy Muendo <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">East Africa attracts millions of tourists every\nyear. Over the past 10 years, its&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/allafrica.com\/stories\/201809170620.html\">earnings from tourism\nhave doubled<\/a>. Compared to the rest of Africa, the region is\nexperiencing&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.afdb.org\/en\/news-and-events\/east-africas-economy-races-ahead-of-its-african-peers-modest-growth-forecast-for-the-rest-of-the-continent-african-development-bank-19161\">healthy\neconomic growth<\/a>. This makes it a promising investment destination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Factors like regional tourism, movement of workers\nand technology development have catalysed East African integration and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.kba.co.ke\/downloads\/W%20Paper%20WPS-08-14.pdf\">cross-border\nbanking<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Many cross-border banks originate from Kenya with\nbranches across the region. One example is Kenya\u2019s&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.investinafrica.com\/about\/partners\/equity-bank\">Equity Bank<\/a>,\nwhich relies heavily on digital technology. The digital space has&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.imf.org\/external\/pubs\/ft\/fandd\/2019\/06\/pdf\/digital-africa-songwe.pdf\">many\npositive attributes<\/a>&nbsp;but the threat of cybercrime and insecurity is\nprevalent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Uganda&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.serianu.com\/downloads\/UgandaCyberSecurityReport2017.pdf\">lost\n42 million shillings<\/a>&nbsp;to cybercrime in 2017. In 2018, Rwanda&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.newtimes.co.rw\/news\/cyber-crime-cost-rwanda-economy-rwf6bn-2018\">lost\n6 billion francs<\/a>. In Kenya, between April and June 2019 alone, the country\nexperienced&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/ca.go.ke\/cybersecurity-meeting-calls-for-expedition-of-data-protection-bill-and-investments-in-more-professionals\/\">26.6\nmillion cyber threats<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Across the region, with the increase of digital banking,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.africacybersecurityconference.com\/document\/Summary-ACTIR-2018.pdf\">financial institutions have become targets<\/a>. These institutions are attractive to cybercriminals because they hold the biggest cash reserves. Africa\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.serianu.com\/downloads\/AfricaCyberSecurityReport2017.pdf\">digital infrastructure is ill-equipped<\/a>\u00a0to manage the continent\u2019s growing cyber-security risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Equity is a pioneer in online and mobile banking\nwith technology that&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theafricareport.com\/11255\/kenyas-equity-bank-relies-increasingly-on-digital-services\/\">merges\nbanking and telephony<\/a>. However, it recently suffered a cyber-attack. Last\nmonth, Rwandan authorities&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.standardmedia.co.ke\/article\/2001347684\/eight-kenyan-bank-hackers-arrested-in-rwanda\">arrested\na cybercrime syndicate<\/a>&nbsp;comprising eight Kenyans, three Rwandans and a\nUgandan. The syndicate had attempted to hack into the Equity Bank system. The\ngroup has been involved in similar attacks in Kenya and Uganda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Early in the year, Kenya\u2019s director of criminal\ninvestigation issued warrants of arrest against&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessdailyafrica.com\/corporate\/companies\/Police-probe-130-bank-cyber-fraud-suspects\/4003102-4958920-juq0i5z\/index.html\">130\nsuspected hackers and fraudsters<\/a>&nbsp;for alleged banking fraud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/whats-been-done-to-fight-cybercrime-in-east-africa-127240\">Read\nmore\u2026 <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Mercy Muendo East Africa attracts millions of tourists every year. Over the past 10 years, its&nbsp;earnings from tourism have doubled. Compared to the rest of Africa, the region is&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}