The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) would soon come up with regulations to tighten the process of Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) card swap for telecom subscribers.

Mr. Dipo Fatokun, the Director, Banking and Payments System at the CBN explained:

“Some of the fraud we are still battling with is the issue of SIM swap. We have heard of instances where people would say for three days my phone did not work. And because many of us carry more than one phone, if one is not working, at least one will work.

So, what they do is that they swap your phone. That is, they just walk up to a service provider and claim to be the owner of the line. Most often, they have studied that number and they have collaborators, probably in the bank.

And because the process for doing a change of SIM card is so loose, the telcom company would change the SIM card for the person and so he assumes the phone number.

“What does he do? He puts the SIM card in another phone and start using the USSD to make transfers out of the account into another account. So, we are working with the NCC to tighten the process of SIM card swap. It may include biometrics and a unique number may be required.

In Nigeria, we have consistently over the last three years reduced the value of electronic fraud.  The game changer is the Bank Verification Number (BVN). It is not only helping us to identify who owns what, but going forward, just as it was announced by the Bankers’ Committee at the last meeting, the BVN would be used as an instrument to track fraudsters in the system.

When electronic fraud happens, money is moved from one account to another account. That other account that money is moved to, the owner can be identified. And when such owners can be identified, they can be blacklisted or watch listed.

It means that fraudsters can be identified and if possible taken out of the system. So, the BVN is going to be a game changer in the respect. We are working on the final framework and when it is concluded, it would be issued to the industry.

Electronics payment is any form of payment where an electronics system is used to initiate authorise and confirm the transfer of money between two parties. This could be for various reasons, such as payment for goods and services, settlement of obligations, gifts, among others.

Electronics payments are enabled by a network of interconnected systems, which make it possible for exchanges of value between payer and payee, sender and receivers or donor and done.”

The new 2017 edition of ITU’s ICT Facts and Figures reveals that mobile broadband subscriptions have grown more than 20 per cent annually in the last five years and are expected to reach 4.3 billion globally by the end of 2017.

Between 2012 and 2017, LDCs saw the highest growth-rate of mobile broadband subscriptions. Despite this, the number of mobile subscriptions per 100 inhabitants in LDCs is the lowest globally at 23 per cent.

The number of fixed-broadband subscriptions has increased by 9 per cent annually in the last five years with up to 330 million subscriptions added.

There has been an increase in high-speed fixed broadband subscriptions parallel to the growth in the number of fibre connections. Most of the increase in high-speed fixed broadband subscriptions in developing countries can be attributed to China, which accounts for 80 per cent of all fixed-broadband subscriptions at 10 Mbit/s or above in the developing world.

• Mobile broadband is more affordable than fixed broadband

Mobile broadband prices, as a percentage of gross national income per capita, dropped by half between 2013 and 2016.

Mobile broadband is more affordable than fixed broadband in most developing countries.

• Digital gender divide

While the Internet user gender gap has narrowed in most regions since 2013, the proportion of men using the Internet remains slightly higher than the proportion of women using the Internet in two-thirds of countries worldwide. In 2017, the global Internet penetration rate for men stands at 50.9 per cent compared to 44.9 percent for women.

In the Americas, the number of women using the Internet is higher than that of men.

• International bandwidth and telecommunication revenues

International Internet bandwidth grew by 32 per cent between 2015 and 2016, with Africa registering an increase of 72 per cent during this period, the highest of all regions.

Global telecommunication revenues declined by 4 per cent from $2.0trillion in 2014 to $1.9trillion in 2015.  Developing countries, which are home to 83 per cent of the global population, generate 39 per cent of the world’s telecommunication revenues.

• ICTs for the SDGs

ITU’s ICT Facts and Figures demonstrates that ICTs continue to play an increasingly critical role in achieving the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

“ICTs continue to be a key enabler of economic and social development, bridging the digital divide and fostering an inclusive digital economy,” ITU Telecommunication Development Bureau Director Brahima Sanou. “I am confident that the discussions at World Telecommunication Development Conference 2017 will contribute to the fast-forwarding of countries towards attainment of the SDGs.”

A new global programme to advance research in digital finance and accelerate digital financial inclusion in developing countries, the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative, has been launched by the World Bank Group, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI), with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The three-year programme focuses on three different “model” developing countries – China, Egypt and Mexico – and consists of two complementary operational and knowledge work streams.

The operational work stream supports each country’s national authority – countries in which digital financial inclusion can significantly improve access to financial services for a large number of people without access to financial services.

The knowledge work stream is designed to advance research and develop policy recommendations in three key areas of digital finance: security of information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure and trust in digital financial services; digital IDs for financial services; and acceptance and use of e-payments by micro and small-scale merchants and their customers.

The inter-agency working groups tackling these issues will share findings at annual symposia. The first of these is scheduled to be the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative Symposium 2017, will be held in Bangalore, India, from 29 November to 1 December 2017, hosted by the Government of India.

“We are excited to work with ITU and CPMI on this new global initiative that will enable our partner countries to better harness the potential of digital technologies for financial inclusion, and to manage associated risks,” said Ceyla Pazarbasioglu, Senior Director for the Finance and Markets Global Practice, World Bank Group.

As part of the initiative, the three model countries are also receiving technical assistance from the World Bank Group with a view to putting into practice the guiding principles set out by the CPMI-WBG report on Payment Aspects of Financial Inclusion (PAFI). In particular, the assistance will contribute to further strengthening public and private-sector commitment and improving legal and regulatory frameworks, financial markets and ICT infrastructure for financial access and inclusion. It will also focus on improving financial product design; financial literacy and awareness; diversified access points; and large-volume, recurring payment streams. The World Bank Group leads the operational work, with ITU handling activities related to telecommunications authorities.

“An estimated two billion adults are still without access to a bank account, and yet some 1.6 billion of them have access to a mobile phone, creating the potential for e-finance access,” said ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao. “The ITU community is excited to leverage our unique technical expertise to make e-finance a reality for millions of people through the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative, and in so doing, contribute to poverty eradication and the achievement of the global Sustainable Development Goals.”

“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is pleased to support the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative, which we believe will bring digital financial services to some of the world’s most vulnerable unbanked populations as well as advance knowledge on creating a robust digital payments ecosystem,” said Jason Lamb, Deputy Director, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The three countries selected were chosen based on potential for country programmes, level of national government and private-sector commitment to financial inclusion, number of people that could be reached through digital financial services, and potential for reforms to encourage innovation and digital technologies use.

According to analyses carried out by the World Bank Group, Egypt has the potential to bring a large number of people into the formal financial sector (more than 44 million adults). These analyses found that Egypt has adequate laws, regulations and financial and ICT infrastructure, but a lack of funding to cover related reforms.

Considered a ‘last-mile’ challenge, China has an increasingly well-developed legal and regulatory environment and financial infrastructure, as well as a supportive ICT infrastructure. The People’s Bank of China has requested support from the World Bank Group for digital financial inclusion measures to reach rural people without access to financial services.

Mexico has shown a strong commitment to financial inclusion with its new National Financial Inclusion Strategy launched in June 2016, as well as a draft fintech law. Mexico has the potential to become a regional and global model for digital financial inclusion, despite relatively low levels of financial inclusion.

China, Egypt and Mexico are already part of the Universal Financial Access 2020 (UFA2020) initiative. Led by the World Bank Group, this seeks to bring two billion unbanked adults in 25 countries into formal financial systems.

The design of country programmes under the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative will be informed by the same guiding principles of UFA2020 – the PAFI guiding principles – as well as the Level One guidelines for enabling payments infrastructure, and the recommendations of the ITU-T Focus Group Digital Financial Services.

The Financial Inclusion Global Initiative is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation through a US$ 12,238,635 grant. This will be used to fund country-level implementation led by the World Bank Group, the organisation of the initiative’s annual symposia by ITU, and the activities of the initiative’s established working groups.

A telecom analyst has predicted bleak future for 9Mobile, formerly Etisalat Nigeria, due to its $1.2 billion indebtedness to a consortium of banks.

The analyst, who insisted on anonymity, told Business Journal in Lagos that the huge debt burden will make it practically impossible for the telecom firm to operate optimally, let alone generate sustainable profit going forward.

“The prospect of 9Mobile surviving in the cut-throat Nigerian telecom market is very slim. With a debt burden of such magnitude, the future of the company is doomed. The idea of the company looking for fresh investors is unrealistic because no rational investor will dare dive into the current mess called 9Mobile. Its future is simply bleak.”

He argued that with 13 creditor banks involved in the current ownership structure of the company, the decision-making process has become extremely unwieldy and chaotic.

“Despite the optimism of name change from Etisalat to 9Mobile, the reality is that the company does not have the financial and market capacity to pay back the $1.2 billion loan hanging on its neck in the near term. As a small operator in the market, the possibility of generating sizeable revenue in the short and medium term to offset the facility is doubtful.”

He insisted that the story making the rounds of certain firms lining up to snap up the company is more of public relations than realistic investment commitment.

“Of course, certain corporate names have been bandied about in the media but the truth remains that 9Mobile is not a worthy investment for now.”