Customize Consent Preferences

We use cookies to help you navigate efficiently and perform certain functions. You will find detailed information about all cookies under each consent category below.

The cookies that are categorized as "Necessary" are stored on your browser as they are essential for enabling the basic functionalities of the site. ... 

Always Active

Necessary cookies are required to enable the basic features of this site, such as providing secure log-in or adjusting your consent preferences. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable data.

No cookies to display.

Functional cookies help perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collecting feedback, and other third-party features.

No cookies to display.

Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics such as the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.

No cookies to display.

Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.

No cookies to display.

Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with customized advertisements based on the pages you visited previously and to analyze the effectiveness of the ad campaigns.

No cookies to display.

Connect with us

E-Business

Raft of Commitments on Harnessing Data Revolution, Data Crisis

Published

on

Michael Elliott, CEO of The ONE Campaign
Kindly share this post

International governments, businesses and civil society today pledged to take action to tackle the data crisis that threatens to hamper the fight against extreme poverty.

Wide-ranging commitments – including funding pledges, the opening up of valuable data sets, technological innovation and analytic support – were made in Addis Ababa, as the first step in a major drive to harness the data revolution to support inclusive growth and sustainable development.

World leaders are set to agree new Sustainable Development Goals in September, but these must be backed with a rapid escalation of robust, high quality data to track resources to results.

To drive that forward, more than 20 international organisations, including the governments of Belgium, Kenya, Mexico, Senegal and the United States, the World Bank Group, UNSDSN, CIVICUS and Mastercard have also committed to be Champions for the formation of a Global Partnership on Sustainable Data, to be launched in September 2015.

Michael Elliott, CEO of The ONE Campaign said, “We live in a world where millions of people matter so little that they are uncounted. Their births are not recorded; they can’t access basic healthcare, enough food or an education. This year we expect ambitious new global goals to end extreme poverty, but if we don’t deal with the crisis of inadequate data for monitoring and achieving the goals, we can’t have full accountability or a clear picture of progress. Fixing it needs political support, funding and practical action.”

The commitments announced it will catalyse tangible progress in filling known data gaps so that the lives of the poorest and most excluded can be improved.

Amadou Ba, the Senegal Minister of Finance said, “The commitments made in Addis Ababa today are a great step towards making the data revolution a reality. We have seen new pledges that will drive progress in health, food production and help fight corruption. Harnessing data can drive inclusive growth, and allow governments, citizens and civil society to track resources to results. The Government of Senegal is honoured to champion the formation of the Global Partnership on Sustainable Development Data.”

The initial group of champions of a Global Partnership for Sustainable Development Data made specific commitment to invest in, share and use data for decision-making.

They drew particular attention to the need to mobilize new resources, noting that at least $1 billion will be required each year to successfully monitor the new sustainable development agenda.

They also joined a call to action to form a partnership that will accelerate efforts to increase the availability of high quality data to help improve the lives of those citizens who are currently left behind.

A Global Partnership on Sustainable Development Data will, promote new data principles and norms and strengthen those that already exist; incentivize data generation to fill key data gaps that make a difference to people’s lives, in particular the poor and excluded; expand open data access to increase the timeliness, interoperability, use and value of data that already exist; and support capacity building and peer learning of users and producers with a view to measure, monitor, evaluate progress and deliver the Sustainable development Goals.

The Champions aim to build a growing network that will politically launch a Global Partnership on Sustainable Development Data during the Sustainable Development Summit and United Nations General Assembly in September.

As a first step, more than 20 organisations announced commitments at the event, including:

The ONE campaign will launch the ‘Follow the Money’ portal, a one-stop-shop for the best examples of citizens using data to track corruption, advocate for better budget allocations, and make sure public money gets to where it is most needed.

The U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) and the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) will invest $22m in Country Data Collaboratives. The Collaboratives will strengthen country-led health data systems and decision-making.

The Mexican Government is committed to the development and launch of an international Open Data Charter; and to provide personalized, timely and focalized information to pregnant beneficiaries of Prospera, the world’s second largest conditional cash transfer program, via SMS to help empower women’s health through scalable data-driven platforms.

The Sustainable Development Solutions Network will launch a thematic group on data and information systems for development to identify new innovative approaches to data collection for the SDGs, and to make this input useful for policy makers.

CIVICUS will work to build the capacity of civil society, particularly in the Global South, to produce and use data for the SDGs through its DataShift initiative.

MasterCard, in partnership with Datakind, will organize data scientists to partner with public sector leaders to develop responsible protocols around data collection and usage; and provide the technical horsepower to analyse, interpret and translate data into concrete development solutions.

The Children’s Investment Fund Foundation will invest $20 million in improving data on coverage of nutrition interventions and other key indicators by 2020 in at least four countries.

More Champions are expected to join in the lead up to the UN General Assembly in September.

 


Kindly share this post

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek believes that technology makes life more exciting and helps improve the lives of people around Nigeria and indeed the world. So since 2007, we have devoted our energy to independent reportage of technology and how they affect lives.

E-Business

NIMC Says NIN Services Back Online

Published

on

Kindly share this post

National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) has announced the restoration of its National Identification Number (NIN) verification services nationwide.

NIMC Says NIN Services Back Online

This, according to the commission, follows the completion of a system maintenance exercise.

In a statement issued on Friday, the NIMC confirmed that all previously disrupted services have resumed.

“NIMC wishes to inform the general public that the recent technical maintenance has been completed and all services have been restored,” the statement read.

The NIMC urged Nigerians seeking to enroll for NIN to visit the its official website to locate the nearest enrollment centers.

The agency also encouraged individuals to make use of its self-service portal for tasks such as data modification, including name changes.

To further ease the verification process, the Commission recommended downloading the NIMC NameAuth app (oath.app) from the Google Play Store or Apple App Store for quick and secure NIN authentication.

NIMC expressed appreciation for the public’s patience during the service disruption, which had impacted banks, telecom providers, and government agencies that rely on NIN verification for their operations.

 


Kindly share this post
Continue Reading

E-Business

Report Reveals African Organizations Dangerously Overestimating Cyber defences

Published

on

Kindly share this post

Many businesses are overestimating their defence against cyber attacks, which creates a significant human risk blind spot. A new KnowBe4 report exposes a worrying disconnect between what leaders think about their cyber security readiness and what employees experience.

According to the KnowBe4 Africa Human Risk Management Report 2025, based on insights from cyber security decision-makers across 30 African countries, despite high awareness, a critical gap exists in turning that awareness into actual readiness and resilient behaviour.

Key findings from the KnowBe4 Africa Human Risk Management Report 2025:

Confidence vs awareness: While cyber security awareness is high, leaders express uncertainty about their workforce’s ability to act on that awareness. Many feel employees may overestimate their capabilities in recognising, reporting and mitigating threats.

The need for adaptive and personalised security awareness training: Many companies fail to personalise security awareness training to specific roles or risk exposures.

Widespread BYOD usage: A large percentage of employees (between 41% and 80%) use their personal devices for work.

AI policy development is lagging: Many companies (46%) are still in the process of developing policies for using AI tools in the workplace.

Regional variation: Southern Africa trains more, East Africa governs AI better and West/Central Africa sees the most human-related security incidents.

This gap is significant because Africa has become an attractive target to cyber criminals, especially those that launch AI-powered attacks. A LexisNexis Risk Solutions study found 60% of South African organisations have seen an increase in AI-facilitated financial crime – above the 56% global average.

Kehinde Popoola, regional manager and key representative for West and East Africa at Rubrik, said digital transformation is gaining momentum in Africa and companies are more exposed to cyber risk. The Rubrik executive adds that amid an increase in threats, it is crucial that organisations adopt an assumed breach mindset.

The KnowBe4 research shows that cyber security preparedness and the actual structures required to support secure behaviour seem misaligned.

The report highlights that just 10% of cyber security leaders are fully confident that staff would report a phishing attack or other cyber threat, despite rating employee security awareness of cyber threats at four out of five or higher.

There is also a significant perception gap between decision-makers and general employees in Africa regarding security awareness training, with 68% of leaders believing that training is tailored to roles, compared to only a third of employees feeling adequately trained.

KnowBe4 asserts that many organisations only conduct annual or biannual training that is too generic to effectively change behaviour, contributing to uncertainty about its effectiveness.

According to another report, the KnowBe4 African Cybersecurity and Awareness Report 2025, which focuses on end-user based responses, only 43% of African respondents felt confident in their ability to recognise a cyber threat, and just one in three believed their security awareness training was adequately tailored to their role. This comparison suggests the development of a dangerous perception gap in many organisations.

“There’s a disconnect here – between what leaders think is happening and what employees are actually experiencing,” says Anna Collard, SVP content strategy and evangelist at KnowBe4 Africa. “The data shows that without procedural and cultural follow-through, awareness simply doesn’t translate into readiness.”

“The continent’s cyber security posture may be more confident than it is truly resilient,” Collard adds.

 


Kindly share this post
Continue Reading

E-Business

Domain of Deception as Attackers Deploy Spyware Under Guise of Legal Threats

Published

on

Kindly share this post

Kaspersky has detected a rapidly escalating malicious campaign that has targeted over 1,100 corporate users since June 2025. The attackers pose as a legal firm and in their emails threaten recipients with lawsuits over alleged domain name patent violations, aiming to deploy malware.

Victims who opened and launched the attached files – that mimicked legal documents – had a Trojan installed on their devices, and the attackers could spy on the content of their screens. Organisations across healthcare, finance, and education sectors have been targeted.

The campaign began with 95 emails on June 11 and has since continued to escalate. Apart from claiming that the recipient’s domain name violates patented combinations of a major brand and threatening litigation, in the email the fake legal bureau also expresses the patent holders’ interest in acquiring the domain and offers getting acquainted with the details of the alleged violations by opening the attached archive with “documents”.

It is worth noting that the attackers, likely to avoid detection, attach an archive that is not password protected, and inside it includes another archive that is password protected and a file containing the password along with it.

After the user entered the archive password and clicked on the alleged legal document inside, a Trojan was installed on the device. The user saw a message displayed that read, “This document cannot be opened on this device. Try opening it on another windows device,” and simultaneously the Tor Browser was covertly downloaded and installed in the background.

Through it, the malware regularly sent snapshots of the user’s screen to the attackers over the Tor network. The malware also autostarts whenever the computer is restarted.

“This campaign is a sophisticated blend of psychological manipulation and technical deception, leveraging fear of legal action to coerce businesses into executing harmful files hidden in attached archives. Its rapid growth since June 11 underscores the urgency for organisations to bolster defenses.

Victims face the risk of losing their private data. Robust email security, employee training, and swift incident reporting are essential to counter this evolving threat,” comments Anna Lazaricheva, spam analyst at Kaspersky.

 


Kindly share this post
Continue Reading

Trending