Data Breach Hits Uganda’s Mobile Money Payment Platform, UK Finds Collusion Between Huawei and Beijing, and Mercenary Hackers Discovered in Middle East

Africa

Pegasus Technologies suffers data breach

Uganda’s Pegasus Technologies suffered a massive data breach that could have cost the company up $200,000 in stolen funds, it has been reported. The attack targeted PegPay, the company’s payment solutions that serves banks and telcos for billing and mobile money services.

Canal+ acquires stake in Multichoice

France’s Canal+ has acquired a 6.7% stake in Multichoice Group. While French-owned, Canal+ has a quarter of its subscribers from mostly Francophone Africa, while Multichoice owns popular brands like DStv and Showmax.

Ghana to tax e-commerce platforms

The Ghana Revenue Authority, GRA, is preparing a framework to allow it tax purchases on e-commerce platforms. The process, which had been halted due to COVID-19 complications, would also lead to automated VAT payment through an Integrated Tax Application platform.

Europe

UK passport checker biased against dark-skinned women

UK’s passport checker has been found to fail photos of dark-skinned women more than those of light-skinned men. 22% of dark-skinned women and 15% of dark-skinned men were told their images were of poor quality as opposed to 14% of light-skinned women and 9% of light-skinned men.

UK parliament finds collusion between Huawei and Beijing

A UK parliamentary inquiry has found evidence of collusion between Huawei and China’s Communist Party. As a result, MPs want the deadline for removing Huawei from the its 5G network to be brought forward.

France passes new law to protect young internet stars

France has passed a new law to protect young social media stars. The law spells out how many hours children under 16 years can spend online. It also stipulates what happens to their earnings.

The Americas

Facebook to stop political ads after US elections

Facebook has said it will stop accepting political ads after the 3rd November US elections. The measure is aimed at reducing misinformation as the results are announced across states.

Amazon proposes union-tracking software

Amazon has proposed plans to use software to track activities of union members as more staff attempt to unionise. The plan is to use data to analyse the threats unions pose to Amazon in the same way that crimes and weather changes might affect the tech giant.

Facebook bans QAnon accounts

Facebook has banned all QAnon conspiracy theory accounts across its platforms. QAnon contend that President Trump is waging a war against Satan-worshipping paedophiles.

Asia

Paytm to take on Google with a million apps

Indian app store, Paytm, is looking to challenge Google in India by publishing a million apps by the end of the first quarter of 2021. Paytm will not charge domestic app developers any fee.

Hacker group targeting the Middle East

A group of ‘Mercenary hackers’ called Bahamut are believed to have their sights on targets in the Middle East, it cybersecurity watchers have reported. The group of hired hackers have already attacked Sikh separatists, Saudi diplomats, and Indian business men.

Amazon against Future’s sale to Reliance Industries

Amazon has served a legal notice to Future Group claiming the group’s $3.38 billion asset sale to India’s Reliance Industries breached prior agreements it had with Future. Amazon’s 49% stake in Future Coupons Ltd reportedly came with a right to first refusal regarding future sale of Future assets.