Mobile money accounts surpass 2 Billion

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The GSMA lauded continued progress of mobile money adoption and use across the globe, stating milestones of 2 billion registered accounts and half a billion monthly active users were surpassed during 2024.

In its State of Industry Report on Mobile Money 2025, the organisation highlighted it took 18 years from launch in 2001 to achieve 1 billion accounts and 250 million monthly active users, but just five years to double these figures. 

The total number of accounts in 2024 were up 14 per cent year-on-year to 2.1 billion and monthly active users 11 per cent to 514 million.

Around 108 billion transactions worth a total of almost $1.7 trillion were processed in 2024, a 20 per cent rise in payment volume and 16 per cent in value.

Use of mobile money services are reported as having a positive impact on GDP in countries where they are available.

Regionally, sub-Saharan Africa continued to lead the way as the most active area, with growth driven by new registered accounts and rising monthly activity in East and West Africa.

Elsewhere, the GSMA highlighted “notable strides” in East Asia-Pacific, which booked the second fastest growth rate for monthly active accounts.

While mobile money initially focused on in-store payments, utilities, remittance and airtime purchases, the research highlighted many providers are evolving their range to adjacent services.

Some have even become full financial services platforms.

Examples of products beyond payments being provided include credit, savings accounts and insurance.

As of June 2024, the GSMA found credit was the most common additional service, offered by 44 per cent of providers.

Barriers

Although outlining continued positive strides for mobile money in 2024, the GSMA noted barriers to further adoption.

In the 12 countries it assessed, eight were reported as exhibiting a gender gap in uptake, with “little improvement from 2023”.

Limited awareness and low digital financial literacy were listed as significant factors here. 

GSMA director general Vivek Badrinath highlighted mobile money had “emerged as a powerful driver of financial inclusion and economic growth”, adding “its continued success depends on supportive regulatory environments that promote innovation, accessibility and help unlock the full socio-economic potential”.

“To ensure mobile money remains accessible, affordable, and safe, it is vital for governments and regulators to work with financial service providers to support financial literacy programs, empowering underserved populations and opening new opportunities for financial decision-making.”

Source: www.mobileworldlive.com

By Chris Donkin

Mobile Money: 5 types of fraud that are weakening the sector (GSMA)

Mobile Money

By 2023, 310 mobile financial services were already active worldwide. Sub-Saharan Africa was home to more than half of these. The continent, which has a low rate of banking access, sees this solution as an asset for financial inclusion, especially in rural areas.

Mobile Money, a money transfer service via mobile phones, is now a recurring target of fraudulent and cybercriminal attacks, laments the Global Mobile Operators Association (GSMA). The service, which has earned its place as a lever for economic growth for many telecom operators such as Orange, MTN, Safaricom, and Airtel since 2007, and is a flagship solution for financial inclusion in Africa, is experiencing an increase in these attacks, according to 84% of professionals in the Mobile Money ecosystem surveyed by GSMA. These are people in middle or senior management positions with in-depth knowledge of—and experience with—Mobile Money fraud.

In its study of 34 countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America, published in March 2024, the Association indicates that five main types of threats against Mobile Money have been identified in order of importance:

Identity theft

Impersonating another person, real or not, and/or representing an entity for the purpose of deceiving others. The person or entity that the imposter claims to be or represents may be genuine, fictitious, or created from a mixture of genuine and/or fictitious information (e.g., pretending to be a member of a family in difficulty and asking relatives for money transfers).

Social engineering

Impersonating someone else to manipulate the target into disclosing information, granting unauthorized access, or performing certain actions that lead to fraud. This type of fraud involves identity theft and deception (a fake Mobile Money agent requesting personal information to update SIM card identification).

Mobile money fraud 1

Infographic: The Main Types of Threats to Mobile Money

Insider fraud

A current or former employee, contractor, or business partner of the Mobile Money service provider implements a fraudulent scheme by taking advantage of their knowledge, skills, experience, or insider access.

SIM swap fraud

A form of identity theft where one person assumes the identity of another by taking over their phone number and/or mobile money account or wallet.

Cyber ​​fraud

Intrusion into the Mobile Money service by hacking the computer system or using a Trojan horse (link sent to a user that introduces malware when clicked)

Fraud and insider threats emerged as a major concern among professionals surveyed by GSMA. Ninety-four percent of them said they were concerned about insider fraud perpetrated by both internal and external parties. Collusion with external fraudsters to commit fraud was identified as the primary insider fraud scheme.

Ali Baba’s Cave

Mobile Money’s growing appeal to fraudsters is explained by the significant volume of financial transactions carried out each year. In 2023, the service already recorded 1.7 billion accounts worldwide, accounting for 85 billion transactions and over $1 trillion in funds transferred. Sub-Saharan Africa alone accounted for 835 million accounts, accounting for 62 billion transactions and $912 billion in funds transferred. This amount of money makes Mobile Money a target for many fraudsters and cybercriminals of all kinds.

Mobile money 2 copy fraudInfographic: The players most impacted by mobile money fraud 

Aware of this illicit interest in Mobile Money, many players operating in the business sector and in the security sector (telecom operators, Fintech, Interpol, etc.) are increasing campaigns and calls to raise awareness among users about good practices to observe. They insist on the need to never share security codes, because even legitimate companies do not ask for them; always check the authenticity of messages and links received and contact the service via its official channels in case of doubt; always use secure applications downloaded only from certified platforms; activate two-factor authentication (2FA) to increase your security margin; regularly monitor your transactions to detect any suspicious activity and report it.

An essential collaboration

Given the dynamic nature of mobile money and the growing threat of fraud in this sector, GSMA recommends that telecom operators invest more in anti-fraud programs, cutting-edge technologies that support security such as artificial intelligence and rigorous monitoring of third parties (agents, technology providers and other third parties). The Association calls on governments to update and improve legal frameworks to address the specific nuances of mobile money fraud, ensuring that laws are robust enough to enable effective prosecution in such cases. Importantly, the collaboration of different stakeholders on various measures, including awareness programs and information sharing, data protection and regular assessment of vulnerabilities that not only jeopardize the mobile money sector, but the entire financial ecosystem.

Source: Extensia

Bangladesh among countries facing widest gender gap in mobile money use: Report

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With a 56% gap, Bangladesh trails behind Pakistan (71%) – which has the highest gap – and is on equal footing with India (51%), said a report titled The State of the Industry Report on Mobile Money 2024 released by GSMA,  a global organisation unifying the mobile ecosystem.

The mobile money gender gap shows the difference in the use of mobile money between men and women who own the devices.

The report also says that awareness of mobile money improved for both women and men in 2023 in Bangladesh, India and Nigeria, albeit at variable levels. 

In Bangladesh, women’s awareness of mobile money grew from 61% in 2022 to 72% in 2023; for men, awareness grew from 74% to 81% for men over the same period.  

It notes, however, that women’s account ownership stagnated at 21% in Bangladesh, showing that the growth observed in women’s mobile money awareness did not translate into increased adoption.

The considerable gender gaps in mobile money account ownership was found in all countries surveyed except Kenya. 

“Once women own a mobile money account, they are nearly as likely as men to have used it in the past 30 days, except in Bangladesh and Pakistan where women’s use is substantially lower,” the report said. 

It also said only 1% of women who use mobile money in Bangladesh are likely to have paid for an insurance product, vs 8% of men

In Bangladesh, India and Nigeria, they are most likely to have been first taught by friends or family to use mobile money.

The report summarises the results of an econometric analysis carried out by GSMA Intelligence, commissioned by the GSMA Mobile Money Programme.

Source: www.tbsnews.net

Best in the world: Ghana claims top spot in new GSMA mobile money regulatory ranking

Ghana

Ghana has emerged as the leading country in the world when it comes to countries with regulatory frameworks that enable widespread mobile money adoption.

This was contained in the 2024 Mobile Money Regulatory Index (MMRI) by the GSMA, which is a global organisation unifying the mobile ecosystem. Ghana beat 89 other countries including the likes of Brazil, Mexico, Rwanda, and Qatar to claim the top spot with a leading Index Score of “95.06” points. The other countries that rounded up the top were Rwanda (95 points), Qatar (94.21 points), Malawi (93.88 points)and El Salvador (93.75 points).

(The top 10 countries. Source: GSMA)

The breakdown

The Mobile Money Regulatory Index (MMRI) which has 6 broad dimensions, is further broken down into 40 indicators which are scored according to relevant criteria assessment. While Ghana scored a perfect 100 points in 3 of the 6 dimensions, including “Transparency and Disclosure Requirements”, “Authorisation” and “Consumer Protection”, it recorded a low figure of 83.75 points under the “Policy Enablement” dimension due to its poor performance under the “Taxation (0 points)” indicator.

(Source: GSMA)

Impact of the E-Levy

A further interrogation of the data showed that the presence of discriminatory taxation (mobile-specific taxes) imposed on mobile money services in Ghana impacted the score recorded under the “Taxation (0 points)” indicator. The absence of the E-Levy and any other discriminatory taxes on mobile money would have led to Ghana being awarded 100 points which would have seen the country’s world-leading score of 95.06 points rise further.

The Index

According to the GSMA, the Mobile Money Regulatory Index was first developed in 2018 to provide a non-binary and objective assessment of the extent to which regulatory frameworks enable mobile money services to thrive. Until 2021, the index was comprised of 28 indicators clustered in six dimensions, with each indicator scored based on both qualitative and quantitative scoring metrics.