Staff Writer - itbusinessdirect

Instagram new yanks on Hyp3r off its systems

August 9, 2019October 3, 2024 Staff Writer

Hyp3r was scraping profiles, copying photos and siphoning off data supposed to be deleted after 24 hours, according to a Business Insider investigation. Instagram said Hyp3r had “violated” its policies and had been sent legal papers telling it to stop collecting data. Hyp3r said it complied with privacy regulations and the terms of service for the social networks it targeted. Business Insider said Instagram’s owner, Facebook, should have been more diligent about preventing data grabbing in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The investigation claimed Hyp3r had been “stitching”…

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Nigeria proposes New law to tax local online purchases

August 8, 2019September 30, 2024 Staff Writer

Online purchases in Nigeria could soon come with a tax bill in part of plans to raise more revenue to fund a record budget, Nigeria’s government is considering a 5% Value Added Tax (VAT) specifically for online purchases. Babatunde Fowler, head of Nigeria’s federal tax agency, says the government may appoint banks as agents to deduct 5% VAT on all local online purchases with a bank card. The policy could be in place by early next year, Fowler said in an interview with Premium Times, a local online newspaper. This…

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French television company Canal+ acquires New ROK film studio

July 15, 2019October 3, 2024 Staff Writer

French television company Canal+ has acquired the ROK film studio from VOD company IROKOtv for an undisclosed amount. The company founded by Jason Njoku in 2010—and backed by $45 million in VC—IROKOtv boasts the largest online catalog of Nollywood film content in the world reports TechCrunch Based in Lagos, ROK film studios was incubated to create original content for IROKOtv, which can be accessed online anywhere in the world. Actress and producer Mary Njoku—IROKOtv CEO Jason Njoku’s wife—founded ROK studios and will stay on as Director General under the Canal+…

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New Mobile-based online lending firms Regulations

July 12, 2019October 3, 2024 Staff Writer

Mobile-based online lending firms should be regulated to avoid their usage as channels for introducing illegally-obtained cash into the financial system, Central Bank of Kenya governor Patrick Njoroge has said. In a presentation to parliamentarians Wednesday, Dr Njoroge singled out Tala, Branch and Okash — three highly-popular digital money lenders — as credit-only mobile lending institutions that could be easily used to launder illicit cash. Money laundering, which involves transferring and disguising illegally obtained cash to make it look legitimate, is mostly used by criminals and the corrupt to clean…

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Venmo app has 40 million new users, PayPal discloses

July 1, 2019October 3, 2024 Staff Writer

Popular payment app Venmo has ushered in 40 million users to the platform, its parent company PayPal announced on Wednesday. This is the first time PayPal has disclosed user numbers for the millennial-focused, peer-to-peer app. In its first-quarter earnings report, PayPal said it now has a total 277 million total customer accounts — including 22 million merchant accounts. Total payment volume for Venmo grew 73% year over year to $21 billion in the first quarter, the company said. PayPal said Venmo is still on pace to do $100 billion in…

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A world of new possibilities from Mobile apps to the blind and visually impaired

June 13, 2019October 3, 2024 Staff Writer

Ask anyone who was around before smartphones, and they’ll tell you life was different. But for Nutsiri “Earth” Kidkul, who went blind eight years ago, life-changing doesn’t begin to describe the impact of mobile apps. Before specialized apps came along, Kidkul would have to plan and prepare much more for basic tasks like grocery shopping, traveling or reading documents. What’s more, Kidkul often needed assistance from other people to go about her day. “I was always at the mercy of their time or schedule,” Kidkul says. Kidkul uses, for example,…

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Vodacom and Safaricom new process to buy M-Pesa brand.

May 31, 2019October 7, 2024 Staff Writer

Vodacom and Safaricom are in the process of buying the M-Pesa brand from parent company Vodafone, in a deal reportedly worth over R190 million. Vodacom mentioned the deal in its recent full year results announcement, saying it expected the acquisition of the popular mobile money service to “further accelerate our mobile money growth plans in Africa”. Vodacom group CEO Shameel Joosub confirmed the plans in an interview with ITWeb, saying Vodacom, through a joint agreement with Safaricom, has done a deal with Vodafone to “take over M-Pesa completely”. “So, Safaricom…

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Millions of Instagram influencers new data scraped and exposed.

May 30, 2019October 7, 2024 Staff Writer

TechCruch has detailed massive database leak containing contact information of millions of Instagram influencers, celebrities and brand accounts has been found online. The database, hosted by Amazon Web Services, was left exposed and without a password allowing anyone to look inside. At the time of writing, the database had over 49 million records — but was growing by the hour. From a brief review of the data, each record contained public data scraped from influencer Instagram accounts, including their bio, profile picture, the number of followers they have, if they’re…

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