By Correspondent

A FINANCIAL Sector Think Tank has urged corporates to adopt Artificial Intelligence (AI) driven solutions in mitigation of Cybersecurity Risks and Threats, including mobile network fraud.

A recent meeting of the Tanzania Financial Stability Forum (TFSF) technical team in Dar es Salaam recommended that AI and blockchain solutions be employed to detect threats and authenticate biometric data.

Their recommendation coincides with the publication of the January-March 2025 communications sector status report, showing that money accounts had almost doubled in four years.

The report, released by TCRA Director General Dr Jabiri Bakari, also shows that mobile network frauds and fraudulent attempts had increased by 33 per cent between December 2024 and March this year.

AI is the theory of creating computer systems capable of performing tasks that require human intelligence. Blockchain is a technology that tracks records across multiple databases.

Mobile money services are provided by operators licensed by the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) and the Bank of Tanzania (BOT). Subscribers use devices with unique numbers (IMEIs) that are stored in the central equipment identification registry (CEIR).

SIM cards used in mobile communication are registered using subscribers’ information in the National Identification Authority (NIDA) database.

The report says that the mobile money accounts growth rate exceeded that of SIM card registration between March 2021 and March 2025.  Mobile money accounts increased by 103.4 per cent, from 32,720,180 to 66,542,276.

Some 90,298,941 SIM cards were registered by March 2025, compared with 52,813,930 in March 2021, a 71% increase. =

Registration of a new category of SIM cards – machine-to-machine (M2M) started in January 2024, when 929,683 were registered. They increased by 13 per cent to 1,050,277 in March this year.

Some 17,152 frauds and attempts were reported in the January—March 2025 quarter compared to 12,896 in the October-December 2024 quarter.

Morogoro and Rukwa regions still lead in reported committed and attempted frauds, accounting for 74 per cent of the crimes. Consumers reported 7,385 incidents in Rukwa region and 5,227 in Morogoro.

Analysts say the increase could have resulted from TCRA’s consumer and public education programmes, in which it advises mobile network fraud victims to report incidents through the toll-free code 15040.

The two institutions have heightened efforts to protect digital financial users. TCRA licences mobile network operators and allocates numbers and shortcodes for financial transactions, and BOT regulates the financial sector.

Six operators offer branded mobile money services in Tanzania. These are M-pesa, Tigopesa, Airtel Money, Halopesa, T-Pesa and Azam Pesa.