Lebara Nigeria has launched the Agent Registration Portal (ARP), a new digital onboarding platform designed to accelerate the expansion of its retail and point-of-sale (POS) network nationwide.

Through the Agent Registration Portal, Lebara aims to create awareness, build trust and credibility within the retail channel, create opportunities for Nigerians to register and become Lebara partners, and position the brand as a modern, digitally driven, and opportunity – focused telecom operator.

With the introduction of the Agent Registration Portal, alongside its earlier customer-focused digital tools, Lebara Nigeria is designed to empower SMEs, independent distributors, SIM sellers, and retailers nationwide by removing traditional barriers to entry and enabling compliant, digital-first onboarding at scale.

Also, positioning  itself as a digitally driven telecom entrant, focused on speed, compliance, and nationwide reach as it prepares for full-scale operations across the country.

The rollout comes as part of a national onboarding campaign running from January to March, 2026, targeting both low-scale retail agents and high-scale distributors.

Through the portal, Lebara aims to rapidly grow its digital and physical presence across Nigeria while ensuring all partners meet required compliance and verification standards

The Agent Registration Portal is accessible via the Lebara Nigeria website and allows prospective agents and distributors to complete the entire onboarding process online.

Once approved, partner locations are activated as Lebara POS outlets, trained and authorized to sell Lebara starter packs, data bundles, vouchers and other Lebara Nigeria products and services.

The launch builds on Lebara Nigeria’s earlier digital initiatives ahead of its full market entry.

Prior to the Agent Registration Portal rollout, the company introduced a Number Registration Portal, enabling prospective customers to select and reserve preferred phone numbers before the network goes live.

The service allows users to secure personalised numbers such as memorable dates, culturally significant digits, or easy-to-recall patterns through a simple online process, giving customers early control over their mobile identity.

The Agent Registration Portal onboarding process follows a structured flow from account creation and document upload to compliance checks, verification, approval, and activation. Applicants are required to submit details such as National Identification Number (NIN), valid government-issued ID, Tax Identification Number (TIN), and address information. Where all documentation is complete, onboarding can be completed within 30 minutes, after which applicants receive email confirmation and next steps.

Commenting on the launch, Mary O. Akin-Adesokan, Chief Operating Officer of Lebara Nigeria, said the portal is central to the company’s operational and growth strategy in the country.

“The Agent Registration Portal is a key part of our strategy to scale Lebara’s retail presence nationwide. It allows us to onboard partners faster, ensure full compliance, and provide both small retailers and large distributors with a transparent and reliable way to do business with Lebara.

“Together with our earlier Number Reservation Portal, it demonstrates our commitment to using digital innovation to simplify access, empower partners, and enhance the overall telecom experience,” she said.

MTN Nigeria CEO Karl Toriola has declared that the era of outsiders telling Africa’s story is over, positioning the continent as a global powerhouse of authors, architects, and innovators.

MTN Nigeria

Toriola made the remarks while accepting the ‘CEO of the Year’ award at the 2025 Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) Recognition Ceremony in Lagos.

“For decades, stories about Africa were told about us, but rarely by us,” he said, rejecting outdated narratives of conflict and need. “We are no longer the subjects of the story; we are the authors. Africa’s time is now.”

He spotlighted African talent now leading global organisations, alongside Afrobeats and art reshaping world culture, drawing the Diaspora home with investments, not just emotions.

Toriola anchored his vision in MTN Nigeria’s journey, recalling a time when Nigeria’s 120 million people shared fewer than 500,000 telephone lines. “When MTN entered in 2001, analysts said Nigerians were too poor for mobile phones. They were wrong. They underestimated the Nigerian spirit,” he said.

From that first call in May 2001, MTN has connected over 84 million subscribers, building Nigeria’s “digital nervous system.”

He described Nigeria as uniquely investable due to its resilience and scalability, dedicating the award to MTN’s “real heroes”—engineers scaling masts and frontline customer service staff.

As MTN marks 25 years in 2026, Toriola pledged: “We are going nowhere. We are rooted in the soil of Nigeria and Africa.” He urged global elites to become the continent’s “Most Impactful Builders.”

Modern messengers, such as WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal and others, are often used for illicit purposes. Kaspersky Digital Footprint Intelligence has conducted an in-depth monitoring of over 800 blocked cybercriminal Telegram channels between 2021 and 2024.

While a range of illegal activities continues to be hosted on the platform, its environment has become noticeably more challenging for sustained underground operations.

Telegram’s bot framework and other built-in features make for a low-effort ecosystem for the underworld.

A single bot can simultaneously manage queries, process cryptocurrency payments, and instantly deliver stolen bank cards, info-stealer logs, phishing kits, or DDoS attacks to hundreds of buyers per day, often without operator involvement.

Unlimited, non-expiring file storage eliminates the need for external hosting when distributing multi-gigabyte database dumps or stolen corporate documents. This frictionless automation naturally favours high-volume, low-price, low-skill offerings, such as leaked bank cards or other data, hosting malware, etc.

High-value, trust-dependent deals (for instance, zero-day vulnerability information) still remain on reputation-gated dark-web forums.

Kaspersky researchers found two clear trends related to illegal activities on Telegram. The average lifespan of shadow channels has increased, with the proportion of channels surviving over nine months more than tripling in 2023-2024 compared to 2021–2022. At the same time, Telegram’s blocking activity has risen significantly.

Monthly takedown figures recorded since October 2024 – even at their lowest – are comparable to the peak levels seen throughout 2023, and the overall pace continued to accelerate in 2025. This impedes malicious activities.

Other disadvantages of Telegram for cybercriminals include the lack of default end-to-end (E2E) encryption for chats, the inability to use their own servers for communication (due to the messenger’s centralised infrastructure), and closed server-side code, which makes it impossible to verify its functionality.

As a result, several established underground communities, including the nearly 9,000-member BFRepo group and the Angel Drainer malware-as-a-service operation, have already begun shifting primary activity to other platforms or proprietary messengers, citing repeated disruptions of their activities on Telegram.

“Fraudsters find Telegram a convenient tool for many malicious activities, but the risk-reward balance is clearly shifting. Channels are managing to stay online longer than a couple of years ago, yet the dramatically higher volume of blocks means operators can no longer count on long-term stability.

“When a storefront or service disappears overnight – and sometimes reappears only to be removed again weeks later – building a reliable business becomes much harder. We’re starting to see the early stages of migration as a direct consequence,” comments Vladislav Belousov, Digital Footprint Analyst at Kaspersky.