Vodafone Ghana has congratulated Madam Philomena Tengey, the National Best Female Farmer, and Boris Baidoo, the Best National Digital Farmer, at the 2019 National Farmers’ Day celebrations.

As part of the telco’s support for this year’s celebrations, the two farmers were each presented with a cash amount of GH¢15,000, smart phones and Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs.

Additionally, they received airtime and data for 12 months, as well as free access to farmers’ helpline and useful information on crop and agriculture.

Commenting, Tawa Bolarin, Director of Enterprise Business Unit at Vodafone Ghana said: "Congratulations to all our farmers who serve as the lifelines of the economy; producing the crops and items that have defined Ghana and its exporting prowess. Our commitment is to empower females and promote digitalization in agriculture. We believe that driving innovation in agriculture will bridge the gap between farmers and critical farming information. Through our Farmers’ Club initiative, we will continue to connect farms, agribusinesses and rural communities to drive productivity, profitability and innovation."

Vodafone also presented GH¢10,000 cash, to the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) ahead of this year’s National Farmers’ Day event. All the winners at this year’s event also received Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs and smart phones in line with the telco’s unwavering commitment to promoting agricultural in Ghana.

This year, Vodafone extended its support to the Best Digital Farmer, in fulfillment of a promise made last year, to celebrate farmers who among other things use innovative and new technology in their operations.

The 35th edition of the National Farmers Day celebration was held in the Volta Region.

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

 
To climax the 10th anniversary celebration of its Mobile Money (MoMo) service, MTN Ghana on Friday showed appreciation to stakeholders for their contribution towards the success of the service.

MoMo allows customers to use mobile phones to directly send monies into their bank accounts and vice versa, purchase airtime, and pay bills.

The telecommunication network rewarded them with citations and plaques.

The categories for the awards were; ‘Pioneering Momo Partner Banks' - Fidelity Bank, Ecobank, Cal Bank, GT Bank, Access Bank, Zenith Bank, UBA, UMB, and Stanbic Bank.

Barclay’s Bank, Republic Bank, and First Atlantic Bank were adjudged as ‘Emerging Partner Banks with Great Impact”, while Fidelity Bank was also honoured as the ‘MoMo Partner Bank Frontrunner’.

Other categories were; the ‘MoMo Fintech Pioneer’ - IT Consortium, and CoreNett Limited, and ‘Emerging and Innovative Fintech Partner' – ‘appsNmobile Solutions'.

miLife Insurance, was honoured with the ‘First MoMo Advance Service Award', DSTV of MultiChoice Ghana Limited with the ‘First MoMo Bill Payment Award,’ Ghana National College with the ‘First MoMo School Fees Award' and Star Oil Company as the ‘Most Supportive MoMo Merchant.’

Individuals were also awarded for their contributions to the success of MoMo.

They were; Mr Gideon Osei Amoako as the ‘MoMo Patron,’ Mrs Elly Ohene-Adu as the ‘MoMo Powerbroker,’ Dr Settor Kwabla Amediku as the ‘MoMo Regulatory Influencer,’ and Mr Eli Hini as the ‘MoMo Trailblazer.’

Others were; Mr Bruno Akpaka as the ‘MoMo Master Minder,’ Mr George Nenyi Andah as the ‘MoMo Brand Builder,’ and Mr Ebenezer Twum Asante as the ‘MoMo Game Change.’

Mr Selorm Adadevoh, the Chief Executive Officer of MTN Ghana Limited, said MoMo enhanced financial inclusion, economic growth, and accelerated development by creating jobs for people.

He, therefore, urged the government to join forces with stakeholders to develop strategies that would leverage the power of MoMo to recapitalise economic potential growth.

He pledged the commitment of MTN to support government’s agenda to digitise the economy, such as the ‘government to people and people to government form of payment'.

Mr Eli Hini, the General Manager of MTN MoMo, said MTN Ghana needed a committed leadership and workers to sustain MoMo when it was launched in July 21, 2009.

He commended staff and all stakeholders including; MoMo agents and customers for sustaining and contributing to the growth of the service.

Over 100,000 customers subscribed to the service six months after it was launched, however, it currently has over 14 million subscribers, out of which nine million were 30-days active users, he said.

Mr Hini said MTN currently had 140,000 active mobile money agents nationwide.

He mentioned fraud as one challenge the network faced with the MoMo service, however, the company had invested heavily to control the canker.

Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, the Minister of Finance in a speech delivered on his behalf commended MTN for providing jobs for almost half of the population.

He encouraged MTN to work directly with microfinance institutions to drive growth of the financial sector.

Source: GNA

The Ghana Statistical Service, Vodafone Ghana and the Flowminder Foundation, an NGO that provides insights, tools and capacity-strengthening to governments, international agencies and NGOs, have embarked on a partnership to produce official statistics using identified telecommunications data to strengthen humanitarian and development decision-making in the country.

Under the partnership, some staff of the statistical agency are undergoing training on how to use data to solve critical problems and inform policy decisions.

The collaboration is aimed at taking advantage of technology to transform the production of official statistics.

Speaking to Citi Business News, a former Government Statistician and current chairperson of the GSS, Dr. Grace Bediako, says the project, which will end in 2020, will benefit Ghana immensely.

“This is part of what we have been calling big data. A lot of information housed in many service providers domain and in this case the telcos and we are working with Vodafone. So, we are hoping that this will help us bridge the data gaps because with the SDGs, there is a lot that we need to inform ourselves about and track; mobility is part of it,” she said.

Data Scientist and Project Manager at Flowminder, Tracey Li says the data will help the country in diverse ways.

“Our role in this project is to strengthen capacity within the GSS by way of providing tools, knowledge and skills to enable staff of GSS be able to process and analyze telecommunications data and incorporate that data into the production of official statistics,” she explained.

Source: www.citibusinessnews.com

The state is losing more than GH¢3 million a month to an illegal scheme that diverts international calls into local ones, according to the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications.
Known as sim box fraud, the illegality is perpetrated by Ghanaians and their international partners who route international calls through the Internet and terminate them on local mobile phone numbers to attract local charges.

The mechanism denies the government the necessary revenue from international calls.
Beyond the monthly losses, activities of the fraudsters have also led to a decline in International Direct Dialling (IDD) revenue from as high as GH¢222 million in 2012 to about GH¢56 million, which is projected for the end of 2019, a 74 per cent reduction.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, Mr Kenneth Ashigbey, who made this known to the Daily Graphic in an interview, said the fraudsters were now employing newer and more improved technologies to help mask their locations and make it difficult to trace their whereabouts.

New schemes

He said although the telecom companies (telcos) had blocked about 70,000 SIM cards since January this year, they had also identified a number of new schemes employed by the fraudsters to perpetrate the illegality.

They included bypass, CLI masking and number refilling, both of which had the same effects as SIM box fraud.

“In CLI masking, the offending operator manipulates the calling party number to make it look as if it were a local call,” Mr Ashigbey explained.

That means that telecom operators in the country would not be able to bill the appropriate rate for such transactions, he said, adding that the difference then went to the fraudsters through their international counterparts.

As a result, Mr Ashigbey said, some of the telcos had also adopted advanced technology to ruthlessly deal with the emerging phenomenon.

“Our members have to ensure that we are also ahead of the curve, so that we can arrest these fraudsters, but it requires investments in new technologies, systems and processes to counter the fraudsters,” he said.

Pricing

Asked why the illegality persisted and how it could be resolved, he said as an industry, the chamber had always advocated the removal of the surcharge on incoming international traffic (SIIT).

That was because the fraudsters were currently leveraging and exploiting the arbitrage between the international rate of 19 cents and local rate of 10Gp per minute.

“We have made presentations to the government on the issue on several occasions and are still engaged to ensure that we deal with the issue.

“Within this much liberalised economy, we should remove the $0.19 on all international incoming minutes and allow the market to determine the tariff. We need to take out the arbitrage that currently exists,” he said.

However, Mr Ashigbey noted that based on the constant and continuous research and work by the telecommunications companies, telcos continued to find ways of cleaning up the telecommunications and cyber space in a bid to improve cyber hygiene and make the ecosystem safe for customers.

Clamp down

On the role of the police in clamping down on such fraudsters, the Head of the Cyber Crime Unit of the Ghana Police Service, Dr Gustav Yankson, told the Daily Graphic that although there was an alarming surge in the activities of the fraudsters, a joint effort by the Cyber Crime Unit and the Telecommunications Chamber had resulted in a series of operations to round up the criminals in different locations in Accra.

Arrests

Within the last two weeks, he said, the joint effort had resulted in raids at different locations within Accra, in the course of which four adults were arrested, while two others were on the run.

All the arrests were made in suburbs of Accra, including Alhaji Tabora, Nungua, Awudome Estates and Mamprobi.

Although the police did not give the names of the arrested suspects, Daily Graphic checks revealed the identities of the suspects as Comfort Dede, arrested at Korle Gonno, Emmanuel Nii Tagoe, arrested at Awudome Estate.

The rest are Mallam Bako and Defence Doh, both arrested at Alhaji Tabora, and Richard Wils Kobby, who was arrested at Nungua.

Destruction

In all, five SIM boxes, each loaded with a minimum of 100 SIM cards, were retrieved from the fraudsters.

Asked what would be the fate of the suspects, Dr Yankson said the police were conducting further investigations, after which the suspects would be arraigned.

He explained that due to the fact that the suspects would be charged with fraud, the police needed to ascertain how much their activities had cost the state as of the time they were arrested before they would be put before court.

Dr Yankson sounded a caution to individuals indulging in such illegal activities to desist from them, as the police would find them.

“We are able to track them real time and, per the law, they can face up to 25 years’ imprisonment,” he said.

Source: graphic.com.gh

Vodafone Ghana has congratulated Madam Philomena Tengey, the National Best Female Farmer, and Boris Baidoo, the Best National Digital Farmer, at the 2019 National Farmers’ Day celebrations.

As part of the telco’s support for this year’s celebrations, the two farmers were each presented with a cash amount of GH¢15,000, smart phones and Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs.

Additionally, they received airtime and data for 12 months, as well as free access to farmers’ helpline and useful information on crop and agriculture.

Commenting, Tawa Bolarin, Director of Enterprise Business Unit at Vodafone Ghana said: "Congratulations to all our farmers who serve as the lifelines of the economy; producing the crops and items that have defined Ghana and its exporting prowess. Our commitment is to empower females and promote digitalization in agriculture. We believe that driving innovation in agriculture will bridge the gap between farmers and critical farming information. Through our Farmers’ Club initiative, we will continue to connect farms, agribusinesses and rural communities to drive productivity, profitability and innovation."

Vodafone also presented GH¢10,000 cash, to the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) ahead of this year’s National Farmers’ Day event. All the winners at this year’s event also received Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs and smart phones in line with the telco’s unwavering commitment to promoting agricultural in Ghana.

This year, Vodafone extended its support to the Best Digital Farmer, in fulfillment of a promise made last year, to celebrate farmers who among other things use innovative and new technology in their operations.

The 35th edition of the National Farmers Day celebration was held in the Volta Region.

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

 
To climax the 10th anniversary celebration of its Mobile Money (MoMo) service, MTN Ghana on Friday showed appreciation to stakeholders for their contribution towards the success of the service.

MoMo allows customers to use mobile phones to directly send monies into their bank accounts and vice versa, purchase airtime, and pay bills.

The telecommunication network rewarded them with citations and plaques.

The categories for the awards were; ‘Pioneering Momo Partner Banks' - Fidelity Bank, Ecobank, Cal Bank, GT Bank, Access Bank, Zenith Bank, UBA, UMB, and Stanbic Bank.

Barclay’s Bank, Republic Bank, and First Atlantic Bank were adjudged as ‘Emerging Partner Banks with Great Impact”, while Fidelity Bank was also honoured as the ‘MoMo Partner Bank Frontrunner’.

Other categories were; the ‘MoMo Fintech Pioneer’ - IT Consortium, and CoreNett Limited, and ‘Emerging and Innovative Fintech Partner' – ‘appsNmobile Solutions'.

miLife Insurance, was honoured with the ‘First MoMo Advance Service Award', DSTV of MultiChoice Ghana Limited with the ‘First MoMo Bill Payment Award,’ Ghana National College with the ‘First MoMo School Fees Award' and Star Oil Company as the ‘Most Supportive MoMo Merchant.’

Individuals were also awarded for their contributions to the success of MoMo.

They were; Mr Gideon Osei Amoako as the ‘MoMo Patron,’ Mrs Elly Ohene-Adu as the ‘MoMo Powerbroker,’ Dr Settor Kwabla Amediku as the ‘MoMo Regulatory Influencer,’ and Mr Eli Hini as the ‘MoMo Trailblazer.’

Others were; Mr Bruno Akpaka as the ‘MoMo Master Minder,’ Mr George Nenyi Andah as the ‘MoMo Brand Builder,’ and Mr Ebenezer Twum Asante as the ‘MoMo Game Change.’

Mr Selorm Adadevoh, the Chief Executive Officer of MTN Ghana Limited, said MoMo enhanced financial inclusion, economic growth, and accelerated development by creating jobs for people.

He, therefore, urged the government to join forces with stakeholders to develop strategies that would leverage the power of MoMo to recapitalise economic potential growth.

He pledged the commitment of MTN to support government’s agenda to digitise the economy, such as the ‘government to people and people to government form of payment'.

Mr Eli Hini, the General Manager of MTN MoMo, said MTN Ghana needed a committed leadership and workers to sustain MoMo when it was launched in July 21, 2009.

He commended staff and all stakeholders including; MoMo agents and customers for sustaining and contributing to the growth of the service.

Over 100,000 customers subscribed to the service six months after it was launched, however, it currently has over 14 million subscribers, out of which nine million were 30-days active users, he said.

Mr Hini said MTN currently had 140,000 active mobile money agents nationwide.

He mentioned fraud as one challenge the network faced with the MoMo service, however, the company had invested heavily to control the canker.

Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, the Minister of Finance in a speech delivered on his behalf commended MTN for providing jobs for almost half of the population.

He encouraged MTN to work directly with microfinance institutions to drive growth of the financial sector.

Source: GNA

The Ghana Statistical Service, Vodafone Ghana and the Flowminder Foundation, an NGO that provides insights, tools and capacity-strengthening to governments, international agencies and NGOs, have embarked on a partnership to produce official statistics using identified telecommunications data to strengthen humanitarian and development decision-making in the country.

Under the partnership, some staff of the statistical agency are undergoing training on how to use data to solve critical problems and inform policy decisions.

The collaboration is aimed at taking advantage of technology to transform the production of official statistics.

Speaking to Citi Business News, a former Government Statistician and current chairperson of the GSS, Dr. Grace Bediako, says the project, which will end in 2020, will benefit Ghana immensely.

“This is part of what we have been calling big data. A lot of information housed in many service providers domain and in this case the telcos and we are working with Vodafone. So, we are hoping that this will help us bridge the data gaps because with the SDGs, there is a lot that we need to inform ourselves about and track; mobility is part of it,” she said.

Data Scientist and Project Manager at Flowminder, Tracey Li says the data will help the country in diverse ways.

“Our role in this project is to strengthen capacity within the GSS by way of providing tools, knowledge and skills to enable staff of GSS be able to process and analyze telecommunications data and incorporate that data into the production of official statistics,” she explained.

Source: www.citibusinessnews.com

The state is losing more than GH¢3 million a month to an illegal scheme that diverts international calls into local ones, according to the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications.
Known as sim box fraud, the illegality is perpetrated by Ghanaians and their international partners who route international calls through the Internet and terminate them on local mobile phone numbers to attract local charges.

The mechanism denies the government the necessary revenue from international calls.
Beyond the monthly losses, activities of the fraudsters have also led to a decline in International Direct Dialling (IDD) revenue from as high as GH¢222 million in 2012 to about GH¢56 million, which is projected for the end of 2019, a 74 per cent reduction.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, Mr Kenneth Ashigbey, who made this known to the Daily Graphic in an interview, said the fraudsters were now employing newer and more improved technologies to help mask their locations and make it difficult to trace their whereabouts.

New schemes

He said although the telecom companies (telcos) had blocked about 70,000 SIM cards since January this year, they had also identified a number of new schemes employed by the fraudsters to perpetrate the illegality.

They included bypass, CLI masking and number refilling, both of which had the same effects as SIM box fraud.

“In CLI masking, the offending operator manipulates the calling party number to make it look as if it were a local call,” Mr Ashigbey explained.

That means that telecom operators in the country would not be able to bill the appropriate rate for such transactions, he said, adding that the difference then went to the fraudsters through their international counterparts.

As a result, Mr Ashigbey said, some of the telcos had also adopted advanced technology to ruthlessly deal with the emerging phenomenon.

“Our members have to ensure that we are also ahead of the curve, so that we can arrest these fraudsters, but it requires investments in new technologies, systems and processes to counter the fraudsters,” he said.

Pricing

Asked why the illegality persisted and how it could be resolved, he said as an industry, the chamber had always advocated the removal of the surcharge on incoming international traffic (SIIT).

That was because the fraudsters were currently leveraging and exploiting the arbitrage between the international rate of 19 cents and local rate of 10Gp per minute.

“We have made presentations to the government on the issue on several occasions and are still engaged to ensure that we deal with the issue.

“Within this much liberalised economy, we should remove the $0.19 on all international incoming minutes and allow the market to determine the tariff. We need to take out the arbitrage that currently exists,” he said.

However, Mr Ashigbey noted that based on the constant and continuous research and work by the telecommunications companies, telcos continued to find ways of cleaning up the telecommunications and cyber space in a bid to improve cyber hygiene and make the ecosystem safe for customers.

Clamp down

On the role of the police in clamping down on such fraudsters, the Head of the Cyber Crime Unit of the Ghana Police Service, Dr Gustav Yankson, told the Daily Graphic that although there was an alarming surge in the activities of the fraudsters, a joint effort by the Cyber Crime Unit and the Telecommunications Chamber had resulted in a series of operations to round up the criminals in different locations in Accra.

Arrests

Within the last two weeks, he said, the joint effort had resulted in raids at different locations within Accra, in the course of which four adults were arrested, while two others were on the run.

All the arrests were made in suburbs of Accra, including Alhaji Tabora, Nungua, Awudome Estates and Mamprobi.

Although the police did not give the names of the arrested suspects, Daily Graphic checks revealed the identities of the suspects as Comfort Dede, arrested at Korle Gonno, Emmanuel Nii Tagoe, arrested at Awudome Estate.

The rest are Mallam Bako and Defence Doh, both arrested at Alhaji Tabora, and Richard Wils Kobby, who was arrested at Nungua.

Destruction

In all, five SIM boxes, each loaded with a minimum of 100 SIM cards, were retrieved from the fraudsters.

Asked what would be the fate of the suspects, Dr Yankson said the police were conducting further investigations, after which the suspects would be arraigned.

He explained that due to the fact that the suspects would be charged with fraud, the police needed to ascertain how much their activities had cost the state as of the time they were arrested before they would be put before court.

Dr Yankson sounded a caution to individuals indulging in such illegal activities to desist from them, as the police would find them.

“We are able to track them real time and, per the law, they can face up to 25 years’ imprisonment,” he said.

Source: graphic.com.gh

Vodafone Ghana has congratulated Madam Philomena Tengey, the National Best Female Farmer, and Boris Baidoo, the Best National Digital Farmer, at the 2019 National Farmers’ Day celebrations.

As part of the telco’s support for this year’s celebrations, the two farmers were each presented with a cash amount of GH¢15,000, smart phones and Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs.

Additionally, they received airtime and data for 12 months, as well as free access to farmers’ helpline and useful information on crop and agriculture.

Commenting, Tawa Bolarin, Director of Enterprise Business Unit at Vodafone Ghana said: "Congratulations to all our farmers who serve as the lifelines of the economy; producing the crops and items that have defined Ghana and its exporting prowess. Our commitment is to empower females and promote digitalization in agriculture. We believe that driving innovation in agriculture will bridge the gap between farmers and critical farming information. Through our Farmers’ Club initiative, we will continue to connect farms, agribusinesses and rural communities to drive productivity, profitability and innovation."

Vodafone also presented GH¢10,000 cash, to the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) ahead of this year’s National Farmers’ Day event. All the winners at this year’s event also received Vodafone Farmers’ Club SIMs and smart phones in line with the telco’s unwavering commitment to promoting agricultural in Ghana.

This year, Vodafone extended its support to the Best Digital Farmer, in fulfillment of a promise made last year, to celebrate farmers who among other things use innovative and new technology in their operations.

The 35th edition of the National Farmers Day celebration was held in the Volta Region.

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

 
To climax the 10th anniversary celebration of its Mobile Money (MoMo) service, MTN Ghana on Friday showed appreciation to stakeholders for their contribution towards the success of the service.

MoMo allows customers to use mobile phones to directly send monies into their bank accounts and vice versa, purchase airtime, and pay bills.

The telecommunication network rewarded them with citations and plaques.

The categories for the awards were; ‘Pioneering Momo Partner Banks' - Fidelity Bank, Ecobank, Cal Bank, GT Bank, Access Bank, Zenith Bank, UBA, UMB, and Stanbic Bank.

Barclay’s Bank, Republic Bank, and First Atlantic Bank were adjudged as ‘Emerging Partner Banks with Great Impact”, while Fidelity Bank was also honoured as the ‘MoMo Partner Bank Frontrunner’.

Other categories were; the ‘MoMo Fintech Pioneer’ - IT Consortium, and CoreNett Limited, and ‘Emerging and Innovative Fintech Partner' – ‘appsNmobile Solutions'.

miLife Insurance, was honoured with the ‘First MoMo Advance Service Award', DSTV of MultiChoice Ghana Limited with the ‘First MoMo Bill Payment Award,’ Ghana National College with the ‘First MoMo School Fees Award' and Star Oil Company as the ‘Most Supportive MoMo Merchant.’

Individuals were also awarded for their contributions to the success of MoMo.

They were; Mr Gideon Osei Amoako as the ‘MoMo Patron,’ Mrs Elly Ohene-Adu as the ‘MoMo Powerbroker,’ Dr Settor Kwabla Amediku as the ‘MoMo Regulatory Influencer,’ and Mr Eli Hini as the ‘MoMo Trailblazer.’

Others were; Mr Bruno Akpaka as the ‘MoMo Master Minder,’ Mr George Nenyi Andah as the ‘MoMo Brand Builder,’ and Mr Ebenezer Twum Asante as the ‘MoMo Game Change.’

Mr Selorm Adadevoh, the Chief Executive Officer of MTN Ghana Limited, said MoMo enhanced financial inclusion, economic growth, and accelerated development by creating jobs for people.

He, therefore, urged the government to join forces with stakeholders to develop strategies that would leverage the power of MoMo to recapitalise economic potential growth.

He pledged the commitment of MTN to support government’s agenda to digitise the economy, such as the ‘government to people and people to government form of payment'.

Mr Eli Hini, the General Manager of MTN MoMo, said MTN Ghana needed a committed leadership and workers to sustain MoMo when it was launched in July 21, 2009.

He commended staff and all stakeholders including; MoMo agents and customers for sustaining and contributing to the growth of the service.

Over 100,000 customers subscribed to the service six months after it was launched, however, it currently has over 14 million subscribers, out of which nine million were 30-days active users, he said.

Mr Hini said MTN currently had 140,000 active mobile money agents nationwide.

He mentioned fraud as one challenge the network faced with the MoMo service, however, the company had invested heavily to control the canker.

Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, the Minister of Finance in a speech delivered on his behalf commended MTN for providing jobs for almost half of the population.

He encouraged MTN to work directly with microfinance institutions to drive growth of the financial sector.

Source: GNA

The Ghana Statistical Service, Vodafone Ghana and the Flowminder Foundation, an NGO that provides insights, tools and capacity-strengthening to governments, international agencies and NGOs, have embarked on a partnership to produce official statistics using identified telecommunications data to strengthen humanitarian and development decision-making in the country.

Under the partnership, some staff of the statistical agency are undergoing training on how to use data to solve critical problems and inform policy decisions.

The collaboration is aimed at taking advantage of technology to transform the production of official statistics.

Speaking to Citi Business News, a former Government Statistician and current chairperson of the GSS, Dr. Grace Bediako, says the project, which will end in 2020, will benefit Ghana immensely.

“This is part of what we have been calling big data. A lot of information housed in many service providers domain and in this case the telcos and we are working with Vodafone. So, we are hoping that this will help us bridge the data gaps because with the SDGs, there is a lot that we need to inform ourselves about and track; mobility is part of it,” she said.

Data Scientist and Project Manager at Flowminder, Tracey Li says the data will help the country in diverse ways.

“Our role in this project is to strengthen capacity within the GSS by way of providing tools, knowledge and skills to enable staff of GSS be able to process and analyze telecommunications data and incorporate that data into the production of official statistics,” she explained.

Source: www.citibusinessnews.com

The state is losing more than GH¢3 million a month to an illegal scheme that diverts international calls into local ones, according to the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications.
Known as sim box fraud, the illegality is perpetrated by Ghanaians and their international partners who route international calls through the Internet and terminate them on local mobile phone numbers to attract local charges.

The mechanism denies the government the necessary revenue from international calls.
Beyond the monthly losses, activities of the fraudsters have also led to a decline in International Direct Dialling (IDD) revenue from as high as GH¢222 million in 2012 to about GH¢56 million, which is projected for the end of 2019, a 74 per cent reduction.

The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, Mr Kenneth Ashigbey, who made this known to the Daily Graphic in an interview, said the fraudsters were now employing newer and more improved technologies to help mask their locations and make it difficult to trace their whereabouts.

New schemes

He said although the telecom companies (telcos) had blocked about 70,000 SIM cards since January this year, they had also identified a number of new schemes employed by the fraudsters to perpetrate the illegality.

They included bypass, CLI masking and number refilling, both of which had the same effects as SIM box fraud.

“In CLI masking, the offending operator manipulates the calling party number to make it look as if it were a local call,” Mr Ashigbey explained.

That means that telecom operators in the country would not be able to bill the appropriate rate for such transactions, he said, adding that the difference then went to the fraudsters through their international counterparts.

As a result, Mr Ashigbey said, some of the telcos had also adopted advanced technology to ruthlessly deal with the emerging phenomenon.

“Our members have to ensure that we are also ahead of the curve, so that we can arrest these fraudsters, but it requires investments in new technologies, systems and processes to counter the fraudsters,” he said.

Pricing

Asked why the illegality persisted and how it could be resolved, he said as an industry, the chamber had always advocated the removal of the surcharge on incoming international traffic (SIIT).

That was because the fraudsters were currently leveraging and exploiting the arbitrage between the international rate of 19 cents and local rate of 10Gp per minute.

“We have made presentations to the government on the issue on several occasions and are still engaged to ensure that we deal with the issue.

“Within this much liberalised economy, we should remove the $0.19 on all international incoming minutes and allow the market to determine the tariff. We need to take out the arbitrage that currently exists,” he said.

However, Mr Ashigbey noted that based on the constant and continuous research and work by the telecommunications companies, telcos continued to find ways of cleaning up the telecommunications and cyber space in a bid to improve cyber hygiene and make the ecosystem safe for customers.

Clamp down

On the role of the police in clamping down on such fraudsters, the Head of the Cyber Crime Unit of the Ghana Police Service, Dr Gustav Yankson, told the Daily Graphic that although there was an alarming surge in the activities of the fraudsters, a joint effort by the Cyber Crime Unit and the Telecommunications Chamber had resulted in a series of operations to round up the criminals in different locations in Accra.

Arrests

Within the last two weeks, he said, the joint effort had resulted in raids at different locations within Accra, in the course of which four adults were arrested, while two others were on the run.

All the arrests were made in suburbs of Accra, including Alhaji Tabora, Nungua, Awudome Estates and Mamprobi.

Although the police did not give the names of the arrested suspects, Daily Graphic checks revealed the identities of the suspects as Comfort Dede, arrested at Korle Gonno, Emmanuel Nii Tagoe, arrested at Awudome Estate.

The rest are Mallam Bako and Defence Doh, both arrested at Alhaji Tabora, and Richard Wils Kobby, who was arrested at Nungua.

Destruction

In all, five SIM boxes, each loaded with a minimum of 100 SIM cards, were retrieved from the fraudsters.

Asked what would be the fate of the suspects, Dr Yankson said the police were conducting further investigations, after which the suspects would be arraigned.

He explained that due to the fact that the suspects would be charged with fraud, the police needed to ascertain how much their activities had cost the state as of the time they were arrested before they would be put before court.

Dr Yankson sounded a caution to individuals indulging in such illegal activities to desist from them, as the police would find them.

“We are able to track them real time and, per the law, they can face up to 25 years’ imprisonment,” he said.

Source: graphic.com.gh