Binance and Nigeria’s hostile embrace

CybAfriqué is a space for news and analysis on cyber, data, and information security on the African continent.

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Today's newsletter focuses much on industry leaders from cryptocurrency to search engine and social media service apps plus their distinct problems. 

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HIGHLIGHTS 

Binance and Nigeria’s hostile embrace

After eight months of staying in a Nigerian prison, money laundering and tax evasion charges against Binance’s head of financial crime compliance, Tigran Gambaryan were withdrawn. The company’s regional manager for Africa, Nadeem Anjarwalla, who escaped shortly, was arrested together with Gambrayan in February. 

Gambrayan’s custody has sparked reactions from US top officials and even the cryptocurrency company, Binance, which denied the charges and stated he is only a mid-level executive and cannot be held in account for the crypto exchange company. Amid these tussles, including reports of his declining health, Ganbrayan continued to appear for court hearings. 

In March, Binance indefinitely suspended transactions in Naira while it disclosed its Nigerian users could “continue to make use of other Binance services and products for other available cryptocurrencies.” In a similar case, the trading platform temporarily suspended Naira transactions with a few caveats following the government’s ban on cryptocurrency operations in the country.

ICYMI: US vs Nigeria vs Binance

Nigeria ranks second in the global cryptocurrency adoption index; however, it faces strict measures and raises concerns about illegal transactions and scam activities in the country. 

LinkedIn’s data privacy problem in South Africa

Social platform LinkedIn is facing data privacy pressure from South Africa’s information regulator, the South African Artificial Intelligence Association (SAAIA), for using consumer data to train its AI model. The Generative AI product scrapes user’s data and creates posts on behalf of the app users. 

According to the regulator, Linkedin breached Chapter 3 of the Protection of Personal Information Act (Popia), which notes that personal information of users may only be processed subject to consent. In the EU, LinkedIn has also been probed by the Irish Data Protection Commission for unlawfully using user’s data for targeted advertising. They were fined €310 or $335 million. 

With the app’s ongoing testing, over 1 billion registered users’ data across the world could be susceptible to LinkedIn’s unethical data policy. 

Hackers want to have access to Internet History

Internet Archive, a nonprofit digital library, including its archive product, the Wayback Machine, has been hacked four times in a DDOS attack this month. The hacker disclosed on the archive website that 31 million users were affected in a data breach.

Earlier in the year, Google discontinued its Cache feature used for repository or reference purposes, sparking controversy among researchers, journalists, academicians, and other internet users who noted the importance of the archive, especially in environments where censorship thrives and the political climate seeks to erase important histories. 

Google partnered with Internet Archive and recently started adding links to the Wayback Machine to access older versions of the Internet. While it is not certain what measures Google has taken to prevent this, there have been speculations about the source of the hack. 

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FEATURES 

• TechCabal reports that Nigerian telecommunications company Globacom suffered a ransomware attack. Hackers allegedly gained access to Globacom's system, stealing sensitive data and demanding a ransom.

HEADLINES

• EU's NIS2 raises cyber security bar and African trade partners must comply - ITWeb 

• EFCC Unveils Cybercrime Rapid Response Service - EFCC

• Congo launches cybersecurity capacity building initiative for its judicial institutions - Africa Cybersecurity Magazine 

• Moorosi defends Cyber Security Bill - Lesotho Times 

• Personal data of over 840,000 customers allegedly leaked on loan app, iCredit - Technext 

Starlink reverses price increase in Nigeria three weeks after NCC directive - TechCabal

ACROSS THE WORLD 

• Pinterest accused of secretly tracking its users

• 9 suspects held for cyber espionage in Turkiye

• Russia-Linked Hackers Attack Japan's Govt, Ports

• Russia-linked influence campaign shifts focus to US presidential election

• Fraudsters steal crores in massive digital heist

• Over 52K American car wash customers exposed in data breach

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