Hackers have been on the prowl in Uganda with key business entities falling victim to their attacks. Chief among them is mobile money transaction company, Pegasus technologies that suffered a major data breach resulting in the loss of billions of Ugandan Shillings. The breach is said to have impacted telcos, Airtel and MTN Uganda, as well as Stanbic Bank, Uganda’s largest bank.
“Stanbic Bank Uganda, MTN Uganda and Airtel Uganda inform the public and their customers that on Saturday 3 October 2020, a third-party service provider experienced a system incident which impacted Bank to Mobile Money transactions. All Bank to Mobile Money/Wallet services have since been temporarily suspended,” reads an official statement from the companies. “This system incident has had no impact on any balances on both Bank and Mobile Money accounts. Our technical teams are analysing the incident and will restore services as soon as possible. We apologise to all customers for any inconvenience that this has caused and reiterate our commitment to delivering seamless banking and mobile money services.”
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MD of Pegasus Technologies, Ronald Azairwe said that he couldn’t deny nor confirm the incident – “Sadly I can’t comment on that. I can’t speak about it. [The affected] should be able to tell you whether it is Pegasus or not.”
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“From Thursday night, the hack went on undetected until Saturday. By this time, hackers had sent themselves almost UGX1.3 billion but had managed to withdraw UGX900 million from Airtel Money. We estimate MTN also lost almost twice the same amount of money since they are mobile money leaders. When the fraud has detected all transactions going through Pegasus Technologies, were suspended.”
Kelechi Deca
Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry