Author: Francis Muli

Online businesses and payment platforms have become the latest targets for cybercriminals. According to the inaugural Africa Cybersecurity Congress in Nairobi, this has been fueled in part by the exponential growth in mobile payment use. Co-founder and CEO of Agora Group, Hadi Maeleb said Threats to online businesses are increasing exponentially, with more than 90% of business owners unaware that their enterprises are under attack. “Cybercriminals are now targeting small businesses more as they have realized that these enterprises do believe they would be exposed due to their comparatively low turnovers, until they lose their data and payments are compromised,”…

YouTube is inviting applications for the Black Voices Fund Class of 2023. Selected content creators will receive Sh11 billion ($100) million to improve the quality of their content, dedicated partner support and the opportunity to participate in bespoke training workshops and networking programs. The Black Voices Fund targets black creators, artists, songwriters, and producers. “We’re now accepting applications for the #YouTubeBlack Voices Fund Class of 2023. This program equips Black creators, artists, songwriters, and producers with the resources and support to enable them to thrive on YouTube.” Read: I Am Sorry The Black Lives Matter Protestors At US Embassy In Nairobi…

Telkom Kenya is set to join the digital credit industry with the launch of mobile loans services. the company plans to join the growing market, which includes Safaricom’s M-Shwari in offering mobile lending services. Through its Mobile cash platform, T-Kash, Telkom says it has tested the feasibility of the service “From our interactive sessions with our customers, we have taken note that Kenyans appreciate mobile money solutions better when they keep on finding more reasons to attach value to their mobile wallets, whether they are sending money, paying for goods and services, saving, borrowing or trading,” the telco said in…

Kenyans are only using up a third of the country’s internet supply, a report by the Communications Authority of Kenya shows. 7,505.46 GBPS accounting for two thirds of the internet bandwidth capacity remained idle in the period between January 1 and March 31. This means that the country used up only 3,386.19 GBPS out of the total capacity of 10,891.65 GBPS indicating an oversupply. In the past few years, the market has attracted more internet providers who have deployed infrastructure with an aim of reaching more clients. “During the review period, leased/available international internet bandwidth remained unchanged whereas bandwidth capacity…

Instagram is testing new age-verification tools to address concerns from parents and lawmakers. The photo-sharing app will use three methods to verify the ages of users starting with those attempting to edit their ages to older than 18 years. “When we know if someone is a teen (13-17 years), we provide them with age-appropriate experiences like defaulting them into private accounts, preventing unwanted contact from adults they don’t know and limiting the options advertisers have to reach them with ads,” Erica Finkle, director of data governance at Meta, said in a blog post. The Meta-owned company said that apart from…

The Director General of the Communications Authority of Kenya (CA) has revealed that illegally acquired SIM cards had been switched off. Chiloba said that the authority had switched off at least 124,000 SIM cards by March 31 2022. According to a CA report dated June 23, the authority took action after the owners of the SIM cards failed to update their registration details in accordance with the SIM card Registration Regulations 2105. “The decline in SIM subscriptions is partly attributed to the ongoing SIM registration exercise during which a number of SIM cards have been deactivated,” notes the report in…

Senegalese-born content creator, Khaby Lame is the new king of TikTok after amassing more that 142.7 million followers on the app. The TikTok star toppled America TikToker Charli D’Amelio who has 142.3 million followers on Thursday night. Lame rose to fame after his videos, where he reacts silently to absurd and complicated life hacks went viral. The silent videos attracts millions of likes and views on the app, and have helped Lame attract several brand partnerships. In recent weeks, TikTok users had launched efforts to push Lame to the top. Read: Elon Musk Wants Twitter Users to Pay for Verification, Platform…

Netflix has announced that it is laying off more employees as subscriptions continue to fall. “While we continue to invest significantly in the business, we made these adjustments so that our costs are growing in line with our slower revenue growth,” a company spokesperson told CNN. “We are so grateful for everything they have done for Netflix and are working hard to support them through this difficult transition.” The layoffs targeting most of the company’s US employees will affect at least 3 percent of Netflix’s workforce of 11,000 employees. Read: Netflix to help Produce Three Local Movies, Invest Sh33 million to…

Meta is rolling out new ways for creators to monetize on its platforms, Facebook and Instagram. The company is also launching updates to help them create content in the metaverse. Among the new money-making features are Facebook stars, creator marketplace, interoperable subscriptions, monetizing Reels and Digital collectibles The company is shifting to a different kind of algorithm to help users develop new interests by surfacing content that they did not know that they wanted to see. This means the platforms need more interesting, original content. According to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, creators will be able to monetize directly from events,…

Samsung has agreed to pay a $9.65 (Sh1.1 billion) million fine for misleading users about a feature on some of its Galaxy smartphones. The Australian competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) said on Thursday that Samsung Australia had run nine advertisements highlighting that seven of its smartphones had a water resistant feature. The local unit of Samsung in Australia admitted that it had misled buyers of the Galaxy phones about the water-resistance levels. ACCC initially sued the company in July 2019, and Samsung clarified that the issue did not affect its latest models. According to ACCC, Samsung ran the advertisements between…

Twitter is testing a new feature that will allow users to share longer notes with as many as 2,500 words. The company currently limits posts on the platform to 280 characters, and the new feature dubbed ‘Notes’ will come in handy for users who have longer posts to share on the platform. According to a the announcement made on Twitter, users will be able to create a note by clicking on a ‘write’ tab. They will then be able to embed the note into their tweet and publish. Tweets, videos and images can all be added into a note. Users…

Kenyan food-tech and cloud kitchen startup Kune Foods has announced that it is shutting down its operations. The company, which was founded in December 2020 was trialed last year before commencing commercial operations in late 2021. The start-up prepared and delivered low-cost meals to customers around Nairobi. According to Kune Foods founder and CEO Robin Reecht, the decision to shut down operation came after failure to raise funds to sustain its operations. He also said the country was experiencing an economic downturn and investment markets had tightened up. “Since the beginning of the year, we sold more than 55,000 meals,…

Ride-hailing Taxi app, Uber has announced plans to expand into five additional towns in Kenya. The app which has been available in Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuru and Thika is expanding to Kisumu, Eldoret, Naivasha, Elementaita and Gilgil. “We have soft-launched the cities and we will be going as the product becomes more developed. We see the potential in these cities and are confident that they will grow and become very reliable for us,” said Uber head of East Africa, Imran Manji. Rival apps including Little Cab, Bolt and other smaller apps have managed to expand their services to several towns outside…

Kenya Airways (KQ) is set to purchase 40 flying taxis from two Brazilian firms to develop its Urban Air Mobility (UAM) market. The national carrier has signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with EVE UAM, LLC, a subsidiary of Eve Holding, Inc. (“Eve”) and a carve-out of Embraer S.A. (“Embraer”) The LOI covers joint studies through a working group to develop and scale flying taxi operations in Kenya. KQ is also seeking to venture into the delivery business by 2026 with a new business model in cargo drone operations. The operations will be launched through KQ’s new subsidiary, Fahari Aviation.…

The Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) is looking to crack down on tax cheats and bribery by introducing body cameras for its staff. Officers in the domestic tax department and customs and border control will be required to don the body cams in a bid to combat tax evasion. A number of KRA staff have been accused of helping tax cheats by fraudulently clearing cargo and altering their tax returns in exchange for bribes. Rogue KRA officers are known to possess unexplained wealth that is inconsistent with their salaries, running into millions of shillings. Read: Facebook Claims to have Taken Down Misinformation…