Kenyan court strikes down law criminalising false information online
Kenya’s Court of Appeal struck down criminal penalties for publishing “false information” online, a decision that weakens a cybercrime law rights groups say has been used to arrest bloggers, journalists, and social media users since 2018. In a ruling delivered in Nairobi on Friday, a three-judge bench invalidated Sections 22 and 23 of the Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Act, saying the provisions were vague and infringed constitutional protections for freedom of expression and media freedom. The Bloggers Association of Kenya (BAKE), Article 19 Eastern Africa, the Kenya Union of Journalists, and other civil society groups filed the case in the Court of Appeal. “This is not just a win for content creators or journalists. It is a win for every Kenyan who uses the internet to speak truth to power,” said Kennedy Kachwanya, chairperson of BAKE. The judges, Patrick Kiage, Aggrey Muchelule, and Weldon Korir, said the offences relating to “false publications” and “false information” failed the constitutional test of clarity and risked criminalising ordinary online speech. The court found the provisions were so broad that they could capture people who share information without knowing it is inaccurate. Criminalising “falsity,” the judges said, could suppress satire, opinion, and journalistic errors. Kenya passed the Computer Misuse and Cybercrimes Act in 2018 to address online fraud, hacking, and digital harassment. From the start, media groups and digital rights activists challenged the law, arguing that some sections created a tool for policing online speech. Several bloggers and social media users have been investigated or arrested under the law’s “false information” provisions since it came into force, drawing criticism from press freedom groups. The High Court upheld most of the law in 2020, prompting the appeal that led to Friday’s ruling. Despite striking out the false information offences, the Court of Appeal left most of the statute intact. Judges upheld provisions allowing investigators to seek court warrants to search and seize digital data, issue production orders requiring service providers to release subscriber information, and conduct real-time data collection during investigations. The court also retained offences covering child sexual exploitation material and cybersquatting, which criminalise registering domain names in bad faith using another person’s trademark or identity. Digital rights groups welcomed the ruling but said broader concerns remain about the law’s surveillance powers. “The fake news offences have been weaponized time and time again to target journalists, content creators, members of the Public and anyone who dares to speak truth to power,” said Mercy Mutemi, BAKE’s lawyer. The petitioners said they were reviewing the judgment and might pursue further legal action on sections they argue still threaten privacy and civil liberties online.
Read More69% of Africa’s biometric fintech fraud is now AI-generated, says report
African fintech startups spent the last decade building systems to stop fake users from opening accounts. But the real threat may already be inside their platforms. In a single month in 2025, one fraud syndicate used 100 stolen faces to launch over 160,000 verification attacks across Africa’s fintech platforms, according to a new report from Smile ID, a Lagos-based identity verification company. The report, titled “2026 Digital Identity Fraud in Africa Report,” analysed over 200 million identity checks conducted across 35 African countries and 37 industries last year, drawn from a cumulative dataset exceeding 400 million checks processed since 2019, according to Smile ID. The report highlights a structural shift in how fraud works in Africa’s digital economy: attacks now concentrate on logins, account recovery, and other authentication flows, making them five times more common than fraud at account registration. Rather than create fake identities to open new accounts, fraudsters prefer to hijack existing, verified ones, exposing a blind spot in systems that were built on the assumption that the main risk sits at signup, not months later inside live accounts. “The most consequential fraud attacks today are targeted account takeovers (ATOs)—not fake IDs or isolated spoofs, but coordinated operations that compromise the capture pipeline, reuse real identities at scale, and exploit moments after approval when controls are lighter through highly scalable AI-powered tooling,” Smile ID noted in the report. Over the past decade, the percentage of adults in Africa owning a financial account rose from 34% to nearly 60%, creating more than 200 million new accounts across the continent, according to Smile ID. The verification systems that secured most of those accounts were designed for that one moment of onboarding. The attackers have moved on. Authentication is now the primary battleground For years, identity verification in African fintech worked like a checkpoint: users submitted an ID document and a selfie, and if the images matched, they were granted access. That model worked when fraud attempts were rare and mostly involved fake documents or low-quality spoofing. By 2025, that environment had changed dramatically. Attackers now focus on the moments that unlock value inside financial platforms—login attempts, password resets, device changes, and withdrawal requests—where security checks are often lighter than during onboarding. These flows rely on controls like SMS one-time passwords (OTPs), email links, and security questions, which can be bypassed through SIM swaps, social engineering, or insider assistance. The overall share of verifications rejected by Smile ID for suspected fraud declined from 25% in 2024 to 22% in 2025. But the decline is misleading. The number of fraud attempts kept rising as verification volumes grew. The nature of the attacks changed. Petty onboarding fraud declined while attackers concentrated resources on sophisticated takeovers of high-value accounts. Historical rejection rates tell the same story. The share of all traffic blocked for suspected fraud rose steadily from 17% in 2020 to a peak of 29% in 2023, before falling to 22% last year. Fraud networks are reusing the same identities at scale One of the report’s most striking findings is how concentrated modern fraud attacks have become. A fraud syndicate used 100 facial identities to conduct large-scale break-in attempts, signalling that the same biometric data is being reused repeatedly across multiple fintech platforms. Some identities appeared over 12,000 times in verification attempts; another was used in more than 1,000 account registrations within 30 minutes. Smile Secure, Smile ID’s biometric deduplication tool, caught 126,000 duplicate fraud attempts in 2025, up from 52,000 in 2024 and 21,000 in 2023. That sixfold increase over two years reflects not just rising attack volumes but growing sophistication: syndicates now operate supply chains for identity assets, ageing accounts through dormancy before activating them for fraud or money laundering. These patterns confirm that fraud has deeply embedded itself in coordinated, industrialised tactics. Organised networks and syndicates are running automated campaigns against fintech platforms. Attackers build repositories of stolen identities, facial images, and documents, then deploy them across multiple financial apps simultaneously. AI is collapsing the economics of fraud The report also showed that Generative AI has altered the cost structure of identity fraud in Africa. High-quality synthetic documents, deepfake imagery, and automated biometric manipulation are no longer expensive or rare. The marginal cost of each fraud attempt now approaches zero, according to the report, which means attackers can afford to test systems continuously until they find vulnerabilities. In 2025, AI-generated manipulation drove 69% of confirmed biometric fraud cases, including synthetic faces, deepfakes, and face swaps, according to the report. Another 20% were tied to metadata from known fraud networks, while 11% were simple screen or replay attacks. Smile ID saw a 250% jump in high‑fidelity document forgeries, especially portrait tweaks where attackers swap or insert synthetic faces into otherwise normal-looking IDs, while older screen‑based tricks declined. Fraud is getting harder to spot and more technical. Attackers are targeting the infrastructure itself Beyond identity reuse, attackers are skillfully manipulating the systems used for identity verification rather than the images those systems evaluate. Smile ID saw more than 100,000 injection-style attacks every month in 2025, where fraudsters used software‑simulated phones and fake camera feeds to sneak prerecorded or AI‑generated selfies past checks. Its systems flagged 480,000 attempts that appeared to use these fake capture setups. Nearly 90% of suspicious verifications were stopped through its mobile SDKs in 2025, up from 15% in 2023 and 65% in 2024, showing how basic API checks that only see the final selfie or document often miss attacks where the capture process itself has been tampered with. West Africa is seeing the pressure most clearly The shift toward account‑takeover fraud is most visible in West Africa’s digital banks. Potential fraud attempts in retail banking rose about 50% in 2025, driven mainly by activity during logins and account recovery rather than at onboarding, and attacks grew faster than overall verification traffic, pointing to new tactics rather than simple growth. Impersonation makes up roughly two‑thirds of attempted fraud in the region, split between spoofing (33%) and no‑face‑match failures
Read MoreGoogle’s AI search now works in Yoruba and Hausa for Nigerian users
Google has added Yoruba and Hausa to the list of languages supported by its AI-powered Search features, AI Overviews, and AI Mode, bringing two of Nigeria’s most spoken primary languages into its search environment. The update allows users to ask questions and receive AI-generated summaries in their native tongues directly within Google Search. The expansion brings Google’s AI Search language support in Africa to 13 languages, including Kiswahili, Wolof, Afrikaans, Kinyarwanda, Akan, Oromoo, Amharic, Somali, Hausa, Afaan, Setswana, isiZulu, Sesotho, and Yoruba. Google said the languages were selected based on search activity across the continent to make its AI-powered search tools accessible to more users. “With the advanced multimodal and reasoning capabilities of our custom version of Gemini in Search, we’ve made huge strides in language understanding, so our most advanced AI search capabilities are locally relevant and useful in each new language we support,” said Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, Communications & Public Affairs manager for Google West Africa. Nigerians speak over 500 languages. While English is the official language, Hausa and Yoruba are among the most widely used, with a combined 48.7% of speakers across the country. Expanding AI search capabilities into those languages reduces the friction of interacting with complex digital tools, particularly for users who are more comfortable searching or speaking in their mother tongue. Native speakers could type or narrate any question in any supported language on AI Mode within the Search experience in the Google App. This update comes weeks after Google launched WAXAL, an open-source speech database developed in collaboration with African universities. The database was designed to support the development of speech recognition systems and voice assistants. These efforts are part of Google’s broader strategy to localise artificial intelligence tools for African users. “This is about ensuring Nigerians can converse with Search in their mother tongues, making information more helpful for everyone,” said Kola-Ogunlade. Get The Best African Tech Newsletters In Your Inbox Select your country Nigeria Ghana Kenya South Africa Egypt Morocco Tunisia Algeria Libya Sudan Ethiopia Somalia Djibouti Eritrea Uganda Tanzania Rwanda Burundi Democratic Republic of the Congo Republic of the Congo Central African Republic Chad Cameroon Gabon Equatorial Guinea São Tomé and Príncipe Angola Zambia Zimbabwe Botswana Namibia Lesotho Eswatini Mozambique Madagascar Mauritius Seychelles Comoros Cape Verde Guinea-Bissau Senegal The Gambia Guinea Sierra Leone Liberia Côte d’Ivoire Burkina Faso Mali Niger Benin Togo Other Select your gender Male Female Others TC Daily TC Events Next wave Entering Tech Subscribe
Read MoreCybercrime costs Africa $10 billion a year. AI is about to make that number bigger.
As African economies digitise rapidly, cybercrime is evolving just as quickly. Malware that once took skilled programmers weeks or months to build can now be generated in minutes using AI-powered coding tools, enabling cybercriminals to launch cheaper, faster, and large-scale attacks, often targeting businesses and consumers coming online for the first time. The shift is captured in the HP Wolf Security Threat Insights Report, released by the security unit of technology manufacturer HP Inc, which shows attackers shifting from carefully engineered exploits toward a strategy built on speed and volume. By combining AI-assisted coding with modular malware kits, often purchased cheaply on underground forums, cybercriminals can now generate thousands of slightly different malware samples and launch them across the internet within minutes. Rather than investing time in building technically perfect malware, attackers are increasingly relying on large numbers of ‘good enough’ attacks that are inexpensive, automated, and difficult to detect individually. In some cases identified by HP researchers, hackers purchase ready-made malware components for less than $10 and use automated tools to modify them repeatedly. Even if most of these attacks fail, the sheer scale means that a small number of successful infections can still produce significant financial returns. The implications are particularly significant for emerging digital economies. Across Africa, businesses are rapidly adopting cloud services, digital payments, and AI-driven infrastructure. But that rapid digital adoption also expands the region’s cyber-attack surface. According to the HP report, organisations across the continent experience an average of 3,153 cyberattacks weekly—about 60% higher than the global average—suggesting that attackers are actively targeting environments where cybersecurity practices are still maturing. For small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), the economic imbalance behind these automated attacks is especially stark. While cybercriminals can assemble malware campaigns for only a few dollars, the damage from a single successful breach can be devastating. Cybercrime is estimated to cost African economies roughly $10 billion annually, and for smaller businesses, the consequences can be existential. In South Africa, for example, a study shows that around 22% of SMEs hit by ransomware attacks ultimately shut down. In this new era of automated cybercrime, the low cost of launching attacks contrasts sharply with the potentially catastrophic cost of defending against them. The shift from precision to scale For many years, the most dangerous cyberattacks were often the most technically sophisticated ones. Highly skilled hackers would craft malware capable of quietly infiltrating networks, stealing sensitive data, or spreading across systems undetected. These attacks required time, expertise, and careful testing. Cybercriminals are adopting a software-like approach to attacks, using automated coding tools to generate, test, and deploy new malware variants within minutes. This speed-over-perfection strategy allows them to launch hundreds or thousands of slightly different attacks, increasing the chance some will bypass defenses. In one HP-identified case, attackers hid malware inside a Scalable Vector Graphic (SVG) image—a file type made of lines and shapes rather than pixels—which browsers open automatically and email filters often trust, letting the malicious code slip past initial security checks. In Nigeria, the average organization now faces roughly 4,701 cyberattacks weekly. Most of these are not highly sophisticated, hand-crafted hacks but automated scripts designed to scan systems and exploit a single weak point. AI-assisted coding accelerates malware development AI-assisted coding tools—often described as “vibe coding”—are becoming a major driver of change in cybercrime. These tools can generate working software code from simple prompts, helping developers build applications faster. But the same capability is now being exploited by cybercriminals to create malicious programs with far less effort than before. In the past, writing malware required advanced technical skills and weeks or months of work to design programs that could infiltrate systems and evade antivirus detection. AI tools have lowered that barrier dramatically. Attackers can now generate key malware components, such as “loaders”—small programs that enter a victim’s computer and download additional malicious software—in just seconds. Even when the AI-generated code is imperfect, attackers can quickly modify it or produce many variations until one works. Each version appears slightly different to security systems, making it harder for traditional antivirus tools that rely on known malware signatures to detect them. This constant variation acts like a digital disguise, allowing some attacks to slip through defenses—something reflected in HP’s findings that 14% of email threats in late 2025 bypassed at least one email security scanner before being stopped. The rise of modular “flat-pack” malware Another trend highlighted in the HP report is the rise of modular malware kits, sometimes called “flat-pack malware.” Instead of building malicious software entirely from scratch, attackers now assemble it from pre-built components available online. These modules can include loaders, credential-stealing tools, ransomware functions, and command-and-control systems. By combining different pieces, cybercriminals can quickly create customised malware packages for specific campaigns. Automated coding tools make this even easier by generating scripts that connect the modules or help disguise them from security systems. This modular approach lowers the technical barrier to launching cyberattacks. People with limited programming knowledge can assemble working malware using components purchased or downloaded from underground forums. As a result, the number of potential attackers is growing rapidly, making the cybersecurity landscape more complex and unpredictable. Brand mimicry and the rise of digital “evil twins” While automated coding helps attackers build malware faster, they still rely heavily on deception to persuade victims to install it. One of the most effective techniques highlighted in the HP report involves brand mimicry. Cybercriminals are becoming increasingly adept at creating fake websites that closely resemble legitimate platforms used by millions of people. Services such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and Booking.com are common targets because users trust them and frequently download their software. Attackers replicate these sites with remarkable precision. Logos, colors, layouts, and even the wording used on official pages are copied to create convincing “evil twin” versions of the real websites. In the Microsoft Teams “Piggyback” campaign (2025–2026), hackers used SEO poisoning to manipulate search results so that anyone searching for “download Microsoft Teams” was directed to a fake website that looked
Read MoreThis startup wants to bring Bitcoin to Africans who can’t afford the Internet
Bitcoin—and most other digital assets—promise cheap, fast cross-border payments. But there’s a catch: you need a smartphone and internet access to use them. In much of Africa, where millions of people still use feature phones, that design shuts them out. Kgothatso Ngako, a South African software engineer and former Amazon Web Services (AWS) developer, founded Machankura in 2022 to solve this design flaw. The startup allows people to send and receive Bitcoin using the Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) technology, the same short-code system Africans use to check airtime, transfer mobile money, or query their account balance in traditional banking. Machankura’s mobile-first approach targets Africa’s vast base of feature phone users. In 2024, the continent counted 710 million unique mobile subscribers, yet only 416 million—28% of the population—used mobile internet, according to GSMA’s “The Mobile Economy Africa 2025” report. About 860 million Africans remain offline, constrained by device cost, expensive data, and limited digital skills. This divide persists despite growing smartphone purchases. A report by Omdia, a global research firm, found that smartphones accounted for 55% of all mobile handset shipments in 2025, leaving feature phones at about 45%. For hundreds of millions of Africans who can dial a short code but not download an app, smartphone-built digital asset platforms remain out of reach. Using Machankura, a user dials a local code from any phone—feature or smartphone. A text-based menu appears. They can create a wallet linked to their phone number, check their balance, or send Bitcoin, without needing an app or internet connection. The ambition is to do for Bitcoin what M-PESA did for payments: embed it into a technology that hundreds of millions of Africans already use daily, Noelyne Sumba, Machankura’s Director of Operations, said in an interview with TechCabal. “USSD is already familiar,” she said. “People use it every day for financial services. We are extending that to Bitcoin.” Who uses Machankura and how Machankura operates in Côte d’Ivoire, South Africa, Kenya, Ghana, Malawi, Zambia, Nigeria, Namibia, Tanzania, and Uganda. In each country, users dial a local USSD code to access their wallet. The service is now connected to over 39,000 phones, including feature devices, according to Sumba. Yet, the user base is not evenly distributed. Adoption is concentrated in urban and peri-urban areas, and primarily among younger, digitally-aware users, aged 35 and below, who understand crypto but may lack the devices or data to use conventional wallets. “It’s the young people who are mostly tech-savvy, but because either they cannot afford internet connectivity, or most of them have feature phones, it’s very easy for us to onboard them,” said Sumba. “I’ll be more than happy to get to the older generations, but it will take a while.” Beyond peer-to-peer (P2P) transfers, Machankura users spend Bitcoin through a network of partner platforms connected via the Lightning Network. In Kenya, users can send Bitcoin from their Machankura wallet to Tando, which converts it into M-PESA credit, allowing them to pay for goods and services at zero transaction fees on Tando’s end. In South Africa, MoneyBadger, a local off-ramp partner, has integrated the Lightning Network into its point-of-sale (PoS) system; through a recent partnership with Scan to Pay, it now covers over 650,000 merchant locations, including major retailers like Pick n Pay. Users can also purchase airtime, data, and digital vouchers through services like Bitrefill. Sumba cites examples of daily use: In Kisii, a town in western Kenya, members of Bitcoin Chama use feature phones to transact in Bitcoin for everyday purchases. In Kibera, Nairobi’s largest informal settlement, the Afribit project has onboarded 2,600 residents into a similar circular economy where merchants accept Bitcoin and participants earn satoshis through community work programmes. In South Africa’s Mossel Bay, Bitcoin Ekasi pays all staff salaries entirely in Bitcoin and has onboarded local shops to accept it. “These are the circular economies we’re building for,” said Sumba. “We want that local mama mbogas [female vegetable sellers] to be able to say, ‘You know what, you can still pay me in Bitcoin.’” Since its launch, the startup has processed over 19 Bitcoins (BTC) in total transaction volume across its markets, according to Sumba. At current market prices, that’s over $1.2 million in routed value. How Machankura works Machankura sits between two distinct infrastructure layers: Africa’s telecom networks and the Bitcoin Lightning Network. On the telecom side, when a user dials the Machankura code, the request travels through the mobile network to Africa’s Talking, a communications application programming interface (API) provider that offers USSD connectivity across African mobile operators. Africa’s Talking routes the session to Machankura’s servers. The user then interacts with a real-time, session-based text menu limited to 160 characters per prompt and timed to 20 seconds per response. For most of its markets—Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, and Zambia—Machankura uses Africa’s Talking as its aggregator. In Côte d’Ivoire, Tanzania, and Uganda, local providers handle the USSD integration due to regulatory constraints. “They [Africa’s Talking] were very open to working with us,” said Sumba. “Thanks to Africa’s Talking, we were able to have the service in as many countries as possible. Even when we kicked off operations, we started with all the countries we could integrate into.” USSD infrastructure carries real costs. In Nigeria, acquiring a USSD code through Africa’s Talking costs ₦200,000 ($145), with a monthly maintenance fee of ₦70,000 ($51) plus value-added tax (VAT); per-session charges vary by carrier. In Kenya, a Safaricom setup runs KES 145,000 ($1,122) with KES 70,000 ($542) monthly maintenance. These are fixed costs that Machankura bears regardless of transaction volume, an important consideration for a startup processing micro-value transactions. For users with smartphones and internet access but limited technical skills, Machankura also offers a WhatsApp-based interface as an alternative channel. On the Bitcoin side, Machankura connects to the Lightning Network, a second-layer protocol built on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. Lightning allows near-instant, low-cost transactions by routing payments through channels between nodes, rather than recording every small transfer directly on the base chain. Machankura runs
Read MoreAfrica’s crypto is complex. Josephine Inika has made a career simplifying it.
Josephine Inika has a rule about the work she puts out into the world: if you need to scratch your head to understand it, she has failed. This is not an easy rule to follow when your job is explaining cryptocurrency to Nigerians. “The way everybody was explaining this thing, nobody was going to understand,” she says. “I didn’t understand. I have never been a fan of complicated explanations or complicated language because, to me, it is a form of gatekeeping.” Today, as Head of Content at Obiex, a crypto fintech platform, Inika has built a career on the opposite principle. She calls it clarity over cleverness. It is not just a style choice. That is the entire point. The long way to the right place Inika did not arrive at crypto marketing by design; she arrived by experiment. Before Obiex, she tried pageant coaching, event planning, product management, talent management, and even a brief stint in coding. She co-founded Iko Africa, a literary social publishing platform, and ran it for a year before stepping away in 2025. She worked in media, fashion, legal, and design. She was, by her own description, in the wilderness. The turning point came in 2021. A friend recommended she replace her for a content writer role at a crypto writing exchange. She had a portfolio of random work—product descriptions, hair reviews, and crucially, a few pieces about crypto she had written on the side. She sent them in. They liked what they saw. She joined. The person she became at Obiex was shaped by all those experiments. Marketing plus operations plus writing plus startup experience. It was not a waste of time. It was preparation for work that required all of it at once. “All my years in the wilderness led me to what is turning out to be quite a fertile land,” she says. “I do not regret it. It led me here, and it’s going to push me even further.” Why say purchase when you can say buy When Inika started writing crypto content, there were fewer AI shortcuts. She had to read everything herself, understand it, and break it down. That grind taught her something foundational: if she could not explain it simply, she did not understand it yet. Her process now is relentless simplification. She asks: what does this mean? What does it do? How does it work? What is the benefit? She leads with the benefit because that is what people care about. She uses first-principles thinking. She asks why, repeatedly, until the jargon changes to accessible language. When someone on her team writes a copy, she asks them to explain it back to her. Then she tells them, “The way you just said it to me? Write it like that.” She refuses to use complicated words when simple ones exist. “Why say ‘purchase’ when you can say ‘buy’?” she asks. She is not interested in sounding smart. She is interested in being understood. This philosophy extends to where she does her research. She does not just look at what other brands are saying. She goes to Reddit and Nairaland, discussion forums, to look at what crypto influencers are posting, what actual users are asking about, and what words they use when they are confused. “A mistake a lot of marketers make is we start making content to impress other peers instead of writing for our audience,” she says. “You think you’re writing for your audience. No, you’re writing so your other marketing peers can say, ‘Wow, you cooked.’ But your audience is like, ‘I don’t understand.’” The project that taught her to pre-mourn In 2024, in her first year as Head of Content, Inika tried to produce a major crypto report. It failed spectacularly. “That project failed so spectacularly,” she says. But it taught her something critical: how to do a pre-mortem. Most people do post-mortems after a project fails. Inika now does pre-mortems before a project starts. She thinks through all the ways it could fail within a specific timeframe, then figures out how to plug those holes ahead of time. It does not make failure impossible. But it reduces the room for it. “Failure to plan is a planure to fail,” she says. “It’s a ridiculous statement, but it’s true.” The cultural context problem Simplifying is not enough. You also have to localise. Inika learned this when Obiex started expanding beyond Nigeria into Ghana, South Africa, and Kenya. The copy she wrote for Nigerians would not work in Ghana, even though the countries are social neighbours. “Cultural context is something we don’t pay enough attention to in marketing,” she says. “We know it in our heads, but implementing it can be difficult. The copy I write for Nigeria will not fly for even a country as close by as Ghana.” Now, when she approaches a new market, she starts with footwork. What are their slang terms? What cities are notable? How do people think about money? What do they respond to? She treats it like being a foot soldier, learning the lay of the land before she writes a single word. This is harder than it sounds. Crypto is already complicated. Layering in regional differences, regulatory nuances, and cultural contexts means every piece of content is a negotiation between clarity and specificity. But Inika has learned that you cannot skip the context. Without it, even the clearest writing lands wrong. The myth that you cannot kill There is one thing Inika has learned she cannot fix with better copy: the perception that crypto is fast money. “That’s a myth that’s above me,” she says. “It’s a cultural crypto thing at this point. There’s nothing I can do about it because sometimes it is indeed fast money. There’s enough evidence of loss and enough evidence of profit. So it is what it is.” What she does instead is inject nuance. She gives people context. She explains what could happen if they do X, and what could
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Apple’s M5 MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are official. Here’s what’s new
Table of contents MacBook Air M5 MacBook Pro M5 Pro and M5 Max MacBook Air vs MacBook Pro Apple just announced two new laptops, the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro, both powered by the new M5 chip. They are faster, smarter, and more expensive. The price increases are real, and we will get into the exact numbers. But the bigger story here is what these machines can now do. The M5 chip is built specifically to handle AI tasks directly on your laptop, without sending anything to the cloud. That means faster responses, more privacy, and no extra monthly bills for computing power. If you are buying in Nigeria, the exchange rate of ₦1,378.32 to the US Dollar makes these machines a significant investment. This article covers the full specs, the pricing, and what you actually get for the money. MacBook Air M5 Image source: apple.com/newsroom The MacBook Air remains Apple’s best laptop for most people. The 2026 model keeps the thin, fanless aluminium design but adds a new “Sky Blue” colour option alongside Midnight, Starlight, and Silver. More importantly, Apple has moved the base storage to 512GB, ending the era of the cramped 256GB entry-level configuration. This is the first MacBook Air to come with Apple’s N1 wireless chip, which brings Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 to a consumer laptop for the first time. MacBook Air M5: Technical specs The M5 chip inside the Air is built on TSMC’s third-generation 3nm process (N3P), which packs in 15% to 25% more transistors than the previous process. That efficiency gain is what keeps the laptop completely fanless and silent, even during demanding tasks that would have throttled older models. Here is what you get: Processor: Apple M5 chip, 10-core CPU with 4 performance cores and 6 efficiency cores Graphics: Up to 10-core GPU with hardware-accelerated ray tracing and mesh shading Neural engine: 16-core with per-core Neural Accelerators, 4x faster AI than M4 Unified memory: 16GB (base), 24GB, or 32GB at 153GB/s bandwidth (28% faster than M4) Storage: 512GB (base), 1TB, 2TB, or up to 4TB with 2x faster read/write speeds Display: Liquid Retina (13.6″ or 15.3″), 500 nits brightness, P3 wide colour Networking: Apple N1 chip with Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread support Battery: Up to 18 hours of video playback, fast-charge with 70W+ adapter Camera: 12MP Centre Stage with Desk View support Audio: Three-mic array, four-speaker (13″) or six-speaker (15″) system Ports: 2x Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C), MagSafe 3, 3.5mm headphone jack Size: 0.44″ thick (13″), 0.45″ thick (15″), fanless aluminium body The 153GB/s memory bandwidth is the number that matters most for AI work. It means data moves almost instantly between the CPU and GPU, eliminating lag when running generative AI models locally. Wi-Fi 7 offers nearly double the throughput of Wi-Fi 6E, which makes a difference if you work from busy offices or co-working spaces. The N1 chip also includes Thread support, positioning the MacBook Air as a hub for Matter-compatible smart home ecosystems. US pricing Pre-orders open on Wednesday, March 4, 2026, at 6:15 a.m. PST (3:15 p.m. WAT) via the Apple Store online and app. In-store availability begins on Wednesday, March 11, 2026, across 31 countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and China. The $100 price increase over the previous generation is offset by the jump from 256GB to 512GB base storage. Nigeria pricing The Nigerian tech market prices Apple products based on import tariffs, value-added taxes, and local resellers’ currency hedging. At ₦1,378.32 per dollar, the raw conversion for the 13-inch base model comes to ₦1,514,773.68. Authorised dealers like iStore, Slot, and iConnect add their local costs on top of that. Here is what to expect at retail: Nigerian stock typically arrives 10 to 14 days after the global launch, as local channels coordinate with European supply hubs. iStore Nigeria and Slot are expected to begin receiving stock in the final week of March 2026, with “Special Experience” events planned to showcase M5’s on-device AI features to the local developer community. MacBook Pro M5 Pro and M5 Max Image source: apple.com/newsroom The MacBook Pro with M5 Pro and M5 Max is the most significant architectural update for Apple’s professional laptops since the 2021 redesign. These machines are built for high-intensity professional work: high-resolution 3D rendering, large-scale data processing, and training local machine learning models that require serious memory and processing power. Technical specs The M5 Pro and M5 Max are built on a “Fusion Architecture” that lets you independently configure CPU and GPU core counts, a first for the Mac lineup. M5 Pro: Up to 14-core CPU (10 performance + 4 efficiency cores) Up to 20-core GPU 25% performance uplift over M4 Pro Up to 48GB unified memory at ~250GB/s bandwidth M5 Max: Up to 16-core CPU Up to 40-core GPU Up to 128GB unified memory at ~546GB/s bandwidth (double the Pro model) Full specs side-by-side: Both the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models now come with Thunderbolt 5 ports, offering up to 120Gbps of bandwidth, triple what Thunderbolt 4 provided. That makes them capable of driving multiple 8K displays or connecting to ultra-fast external storage arrays used in film production. A new “Nano-texture” glass option is available for the Pro line, cutting glare in bright environments without affecting colour accuracy. This matters for on-set colourists and designers working outside a controlled space. The 16-inch model now delivers a record 24 hours of video-streaming battery life, enabled by the N3P process and a 72.4-watt-hour battery in the 14-inch model. Professional audio comes from a six-speaker system with force-cancelling woofers and a studio-quality three-mic array. US pricing The highest-tier MacBook Pro configurations, such as the M5 Max with 128GB of unified memory and 8TB of storage, can go well above $7,000, putting them in the territory of a high-end desktop workstation replacement. Nigeria pricing The MacBook Pro market in Nigeria is split between institutional buyers and high-net-worth creative professionals. At ₦1,378.32 per dollar, the base M5 Pro 14-inch converts to roughly ₦3,030,925.68 before
Read MoreHow Nigerian neobank Kuda built its in-house core banking application
Until the latter half of 2024, core banking applications (CBAs) attracted little public attention outside Nigeria’s banking industry. That changed when several major commercial banks switched or upgraded their CBAs, disrupting banking services for millions of customers. But five years before core banking was on Nigerians’ lips, the founding team at Kuda, a Nigerian neobank which boasts over seven million customers, knew that building its CBA could be the difference between success and failure. “It was, of course, one of the hardest and probably the most daring decisions I’ve ever taken in my professional life,” Musty Mustapha, Kuda’s co-founder and chief technology officer, said about the decision to build an in-house CBA. “I knew I had to stick my neck on the line with my founding partner, the investors, the board, and everybody else.” Banking’s economic logic has not changed much since its early days: institutions collect deposits from customers, guarantee access to the deposits, and finance the economy by extending credit. What has changed is the mechanics and machinery powering it. Today, the core banking application, an always-on ledger, is the software that records and powers every deposit, loan, and transaction in a bank. As the engine of modern banking, it ensures that accounts are updated in real time, that bank operations are reliable and scalable, and that the bank can launch and manage products. How it happened In 2019, Kuda was still small enough that its key decision-makers could fit on a small table. There were no headline venture capital firms like Target Global yet. The neobank was live and growing fast, but running on a third-party core banking provider. This is the model most financial institutions in Nigeria rely on because building core banking infrastructure takes time, effort, and capital that could be better spent elsewhere. Apart from Kuda, only a handful of Nigerian financial institutions, like Moniepoint and Sterling Bank, have developed their own core banking applications in-house. However, inside Kuda, the third-party CBA was starting to crack under the weight of the neobank’s ambition. More customers and product releases drove demand and a growing intolerance for instability, placing pressure on the CBA. Mustapha knew that this tension could jeopardise his young startup’s future. A series of conversations with his engineers and Kuda’s CEO, Babs Ogundeyi, led to what eventually became NERV, Kuda’s in-house core banking system, named after the human nervous system because it sits underneath everything and quietly controls how Kuda operates. Mustapha insisted on one point above all else during our hour-long conversation in October 2025: when Kuda started building NERV, Nigeria’s banking or fintech market had not built an in-house core banking system like Kuda was attempting to. “At the time when we built NERV, there was no fintech or banking-related company that had built its own core banking system,” he said. “NERV is the pioneer in-house-built core banking solution by a bank in Nigeria.” However, Moniepoint began its in-house core banking development in 2020, and several Nigerian companies like Appzone’s Qore already sold core banking products to Nigerian microfinance banks. NERV began as most banks think about CBAs: shopping. Musty approached multiple local and foreign providers, seeking a CBA robust enough for what Kuda wanted to become and cheap enough for what Kuda could afford in 2019. The startup eventually launched in August 2019 on a local core banking provider. Then reality set in as Kuda grew to a million customers quickly, and the system felt brittle under this weight. Mustapha described three issues that kept compounding: it could not scale with customer growth, could not be adapted to Kuda’s needs, and above all, could not be relied upon to stay up. “If you are offering a financial service, the minimum that you can do is to ensure that your systems are stable for your customers,” he said. “If you cannot achieve this, you can as well just pack your load and go home.” So, Kuda did what most institutions avoid: it kept looking for alternatives before deciding there weren’t any that met its needs within the constraints it had. At that point, Mustapha said that the question became existential rather than technical: what kind of company are we building? His answer was simple. “Kuda is an engineering-first company,” he said. “That is the kind of company we’re trying to build: using engineering resources to solve financial services problems in Nigeria.” Mustapha added that Kuda never needed to run a long persuasion campaign, even though building a core banking system could cost tens of millions of dollars and is slow. In September 2019, the company had raised only $1.6 million in a pre-seed round from angel investors and family offices. This lack of institutional capital meant fewer layers of approval, less red tape, and fewer people who could veto a high-conviction decision. But even then, Kuda avoided betting the business on a rebuild while it was still learning to exist. Instead, NERV ran in parallel to the existing CBA. Kuda continued operating on the third-party core while engineers built NERV in the background. That way, if it failed, the bank would not die. It would keep running, find a new provider, or endure the one it had. “It wasn’t like the company stopped operating,” Mustapha said. “We were still on the third-party provider system, still serving customers, still growing, but we’d decided and were treating it as a side project.” Kuda had another advantage; its engineering talent was willing to take on a long, invisible build while still maintaining production systems. “There’s no way I would have even attempted to go ahead with it if that quality was not there,” Mustapha said. “I’m speaking about an actually world-class team.” The mechanics of NERV NERV’s architectural choices were less exotic than the outcome itself. Kayode Ilesanmi, one of the engineers who built it, said the team started with a clear conclusion: if Kuda wanted scalability and flexibility, it couldn’t build a monolith. “We just had to say, ‘You know what, for
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Apple announces iPhone 17e and iPad Air M4: Everything you need to know
Table of contents iPhone 17e iPad Air M4 Everything else announced Apple kicked off the first week of March 2026 with a major hardware push, a shiftfrom centralised keynote events toward a multi-day rollout of product announcements. This “Big Week” started on Monday, March 2, 2026, through coordinated press releases and product videos on the Apple Newsroom. The physical events will take place at the “Apple Experience” sessions on March 4, 2026, across three cities: New York, London, and Shanghai, starting at 9 a.m. ET (3 p.m. WAT). These are invite-only, in-person sessions giving local media a hands-on look at the hardware. The central theme for this week is “Accessible Intelligence.” Apple is bringing features previously locked behind Pro pricing into its more affordable lineup. The iPhone 17e gets the A19 chip, and the new iPad Air runs on the M4 processor, meaning the full suite of Apple Intelligence features now works across the entire 2026 product line. For buyers in Nigeria and across Africa, where the “e” series and Air models make up a significant part of the premium market, these updates are a meaningful step forward without requiring the price tag of a Pro Max or Ultra device. iPhone 17e Image source: @theapplehub on X Processor and performance A19 chip (3nm), 6-core CPU (4 performance + 2 efficiency cores) Up to 2x faster than iPhone 11 4-core GPU with hardware-accelerated ray tracing and console-level gaming support 16-core Neural Engine redesigned for large generative AI models Connectivity and battery Apple-designed C1X modem, up to 2x faster than the C1 in iPhone 16e 30% more energy-efficient than previous modems 26-hour battery life for video playback Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, USB-C Display 6.1-inch Super Retina XDR OLED (60Hz) Ceramic Shield 2 front cover, 3x better scratch resistance than previous gen Anti-reflective coating, peak HDR brightness up to 1,200 nits Camera 48MP Fusion rear camera with 2x optical-quality Telephoto 12MP TrueDepth front camera with Face ID, 4K Dolby Vision Storage and Accessories Starts at 256GB (512GB option available) MagSafe (15W) and Qi2 support, first time in an “e” model Standout features Apple emphasised Ceramic Shield 2 and an IP68 rating make it the most durable “e” model yet Storage doubles from the previous gen at the same starting price, addressing a common pain point with high-resolution photos and 4K video MagSafe inclusion opens access to a wide ecosystem of magnetic accessories, including wallets, car mounts, and fast wireless chargers Action button now available on the “e” model for the first time, customizable for flashlight, camera, or Visual Intelligence New matte finish in soft pink, black, and white Design changes in iPhone 17e vs. iPhone 16e Same 6.1-inch form factor, but with a new matte finish that resists fingerprints Still uses a notch for TrueDepth camera and Face ID (no Dynamic Island) IP68 water and dust resistance retained An action button was added, which was previously exclusive to Pro and standard iPhone 17 models New colour added: soft pink, alongside black and white Specs summary Pricing 256GB: $599 globally 512GB: $799 globally Nigeria pricing for the iPhone 16e ranged from ₦1,200,000 to ₦1,400,000 at launch (2025) With double the base storage and the current exchange rate of approximately ₦1,370.89 per $1, the iPhone 17e is expected to retail between ₦1,500,000 and ₦1,700,000 at authorised resellers like iStore and iConnect. Availability and release date Pre-orders open globally on Wednesday, March 4, at 6:15 a.m. PT (2:15 p.m. WAT) In-store availability and shipping begin Wednesday, March 11, 2026 iPad Air M4 Image source: @theapplehub on X Chip and performance M4 chip with 8-core CPU and 9-core GPU Multi-core performance up to 30% faster than the M3 model and up to 2.3x faster than the M1 GPU supports second-generation hardware-accelerated mesh shading and ray tracing, with 3D rendering over 4x faster than M1 16-core Neural Engine, 3x faster than M1, for near-instant AI features like Image Wand and Clean Up Memory and storage 12GB unified memory, up 50% from the previous generation 120GB/s memory bandwidth Storage options: 128GB up to 1TB Connectivity Apple N1 chip enabling Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread support Cellular variants use the C1X modem, up to 50% faster cellular data than the previous model, and 30% more energy-efficient Available in Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi + Cellular configurations Display Liquid Retina IPS LCD, 500 nits brightness, P3 wide colour, True Tone Available in 11-inch and 13-inch sizes 60Hz refresh rate (no ProMotion) Camera 12MP front-facing camera with Centre Stage, now repositioned to the landscape edge for more natural eye contact during video calls Standout features Apple emphasised Positioned as an “AI powerhouse” with full Apple Intelligence support out of the box 12GB RAM removes the bottleneck for running large AI models and creative apps like Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro N1 chip brings Wi-Fi 7 for significantly faster and more reliable wireless speeds C1X modem on cellular models is ideal for professionals in Lagos and Abuja relying on 5G for mobile work Landscape camera placement improves the video call experience when using a keyboard Changes vs. iPad Air M2 Jumped directly from M2 chip to M4 chip, skipping the M3 entirely in this product line RAM increased from 8GB to 12GB Front camera moved to the landscape edge (both 11-inch and 13-inch models) N1 networking chip added, replacing the previous Wi-Fi solution Maintains the same thin and light design with no exterior changes Full specs comparison Apple Pencil Pro and Magic Keyboard compatibility Fully compatible with Apple Pencil Pro: supports squeeze for tool palette, barrel roll for precise brush control, and haptic feedback Also supports the more affordable Apple Pencil (USB-C) Compatible with the Magic Keyboard for iPad Air, which includes backlit keys, a 14-key function row, a large Multi-Touch trackpad, and connects via Smart Connector (no Bluetooth pairing or separate charging needed) Magic Keyboard available in black and white to match the four iPad Air colour options: Space Gray, Blue, Purple, and Starlight Global pricing (same as previous generation): 11-inch
Read More“I invest in people first”: How a UK-based Nigerian angel backs startups from abroad
Since the early 2020s, Nigeria’s tech industry has faced a wave of talent migration, which peaked after COVID-19. While the trend has raised valid concerns about brain drain, it has created a new class of diasporan angel investors backing Nigerian startups. Several angel networks have emerged from this shift, including HoaQ, which caters specifically to diasporan investors and founders. While these syndicates continue to grow in membership, capital deployed and influence, some angel investors continue to back startups independently. Though these cheques are typically small by venture standards, they play the critical role of giving founders early runway to validate ideas before syndicates, accelerators and early-stage VC firms step in. One such angel investor is Uche Divine, a 26-year-old Manchester-based product designer who works in London. He relocated from Lagos in 2023 and began investing after his first year abroad. Since then, he has backed two undisclosed startups as an angel investor through HoaQ. Angel investors are foundational to any tech ecosystem. They provide capital when institutional investors will not and often offer hands-on support at the earliest stages. Drawing on six years of experience as a product designer, Ibeafu also advises the founders he backs on product development. For this week’s Ask an Investor, I spoke with Divine about his journey into angel investing as a source of passive income and long-term retirement planning; his founder-led approach, which prioritises trust and product viability over a defined thesis; and how his product background shapes his edge as an investor. This interview has been edited for clarity and length. How many startups have you invested in, over what time period, and how have they performed so far? I’ve invested in two, and because I invested in both of them last year, I can’t really speak to performance yet. They’re still in the building phase. I just put the money in and told myself, “Okay, I’ve never done this before. I might as well do it for my first time and see how it works.” Both companies were built by people I trust. I know these guys; I’ve seen them work, and I trust what they’re doing. Why did you write the cheque—was it more support, or more that you believed in the startups? Both. I have a couple of friends building things—people I trust—but I didn’t give them money. This one was different. It was both: these are my people, and what they’re building makes sense. It wasn’t a difficult decision. After securing exits for its angel network, HoaQ is expanding with a dedicated VC fund At what point did you move from being a non-angel investor to being an angel investor? I want multiple sources of income, and I want to invest. Investing is how I imagine my “endgame”. I’ve spoken to friends, and many of them want to own a company or build something big. But for me, how I picture calling it quits is having a serious portfolio—just chilling on an island and living off profits from investments. I already explored other parts of the market: I buy stocks, I buy crypto, and I’ve played across different parts of the financial market. Angel investing was just the one thing I hadn’t done. So it felt like the perfect time to try it, especially because these founders were doing something I was interested in. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do. When you invest in startups, do you have a thesis, or are you investing based on what you believe will be a good company? And what made you believe in the two you invested in? Because I’m still a beginner—like a baby angel investor—I don’t have a solid thesis yet. I can’t even tell you the returns right now because there’s nothing to measure yet. I invested mainly based on the people building and what they were building, and whether it made sense. One of them is an AI startup solving a serious problem. I don’t want to mention the name, but it’s addressing a key problem in its space. And the advice people always give is: follow the money, follow volume. Most of the companies making the most money right now are AI companies. So, if there’s one that makes sense and what they’re doing looks like it’ll eventually make money, that’s enough for me. To be fair, it was partly trend-driven. But if this is something I’m going to do more of, I’ll definitely develop a thesis. Right now, it felt safer to invest in people I trusted and in products I felt would work. It was instinct. Over time, as I invest more, I’ll build a clearer thesis. Experience improves everything. Are you investing to generate venture-scale returns or to build proximity and learn how startups work? It’s a bit of both. I’m investing for returns too, but right now, I’m also trying to understand how it works. Watching the founders go through this process has taught me a lot. I might eventually build something myself and need to raise money or go through different rounds. So for me, it’s also a learning curve—how to approach fundraising, how to reach out to VC firms—just by being close to people building and raising. What unfair advantage do you think you have as an angel investor? What makes a founder want to take your money, knowing they’re giving up equity? For me, it’s mainly my insight into how digital products work. If you’ve invested in a company, you’re part of it. The way I tell people: I own Google stocks, even if they’re diluted. If Google does anything, I’m like, “That’s my company,” because I own a piece of it. With angel investing, you’re even closer to the company. For the two companies I invested in, whenever there’s a new update or feature, they reach out: “Come and see this—what do you think?” I take it more seriously because my money is in it. I’m not just advising as a friend. I’m advising as a part-owner.
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