{"id":25157,"date":"2020-10-20T15:21:14","date_gmt":"2020-10-20T09:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.subex.com\/?p=25157"},"modified":"2020-10-20T15:21:14","modified_gmt":"2020-10-20T09:51:14","slug":"why-sim-box-fraud-is-still-rampant-in-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/?p=25157","title":{"rendered":"Why SIM Box Fraud is Still Rampant in Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Africa owes much of its recent economic growth to the use of telecommunications\u00a0services.\u00a0However, over the past few years,\u00a0telcos\u00a0in\u00a0the region\u00a0have been hit by several telecom\u00a0frauds, most\u00a0notably\u00a0SIM Box\u00a0fraud,\u00a0also known as the <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/fraud-management\/bypass-fraud\/\">interconnect bypass fraud<\/a><\/strong>. The unfortunate reality across the region is that SIM Box fraud continuous to\u00a0be\u00a0one of the major frauds affecting the dynamic telecom market in Africa.\u00a0Despite the best efforts taken by\u00a0telcos\u00a0to curb this issue, the impact from this fraud\u00a0is huge in terms of the loss in revenues to\u00a0telcos\u00a0and taxes to the regulatory.<\/p>\n<p>Let us look at a\u00a0couple of\u00a0recent instances,\u00a0 to put this scenario into context.\u00a0Recently, the Ugandan Communications Commission (UCC), in collaboration with\u00a0the\u00a0local police, conducted an anti-telecom fraud operation that resulted in the seizure of over 1,500 SIM cards and 4 SIM Boxes.\u00a0 In another incident, the National Communications Authority (NCA), the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA),\u00a0KelniGVG,\u00a0and the Ghana Police Service retrieved 11 SIM\u00a0Box equipment, each capable of using 352 SIM cards simultaneously from Tema, Ghana.\u00a0Suspected\u00a0criminals caused a massive loss of about $2mn per month.<\/p>\n<p>The African market is at a period where\u00a0telcos\u00a0are\u00a0struggling\u00a0to find a solution towards shrinking margins\u00a0while being tasked\u00a0to\u00a0address the ever-increasing customer demands\u00a0by\u00a0investing\u00a0in new\u00a0technologies. During such a time the threat posed by\u00a0SIM Box fraud\u00a0will\u00a0impede the growth of mobile telephony across the continent, which will further hamper the region\u2019s journey towards digital transformation.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why SIM Box Fraudsters still\u00a0Target Africa?<\/strong><em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>As per the industry <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gsma.com\/mobileeconomy\/sub-saharan-africa\/\">reports<\/a><\/strong>, the African mobile market in the region will reach several important milestones over the next five years: half a billion mobile subscribers in 2021, 1 billion mobile connections in 2024, and 50% subscriber penetration by 2025. Smartphone adoption will continue to rise rapidly in the region, reaching 50% of total connections by the end of 2020, as cheaper devices have become available. Fraudsters operating SIM Boxes are taking advantage of the scenario to bypass the formal call termination systems that fetch higher tariffs to telcos.\u00a0 The calls routed through the IP networks are terminated using local SIM gateways, thus compromising the formal interconnection networks and bringing heavy losses to the telcos who have invested in building the networks. Traditionally, African countries are known to have higher interconnection tariffs compared to other regions, which further explains why such frauds are prevailing in Africa.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>The SIM Box can have SIM cards of different operators installed, so a single SIM Box can operate with several GSM gateways. The availability of SIM cards at cheaper\/zero price and the lack of law enforcement over the sale of prepaid SIM cards have also favored the growth of SIM Box fraud, further. Technological advancements have also contributed to the rise in interconnection frauds. The growing sophistication around SIM Box technologies has made fraud detection difficult, which traditional methodologies are no longer able to address. For instance, there are smart devices which mimic human behavior (HBS: Human Behavior SIM Box) which makes it challenging to detect using legacy technologies.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Traditional approaches such as CDR and TCG analysis are also proving to be ineffective in combatting this menace. The Call Data Record (CDR) analysis mainly focuses on threshold-based detection which the fraudsters evade by staying below the threshold and this leads to an increase in the high false positives associated with it. Test Call Generator (TCG) analysis, on the other hand, lags in terms of coverage and predictability aspects.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Can AI\/ML be the solution to address this long-standing menace?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>To conclude, the recent developments around SIM\u00a0Box fraud have further aggravated the challenges faced by African\u00a0telcos. With little scope for regulatory remediation and\u00a0traditional approaches becoming ineffective in dealing with modern SIM\u00a0Box strategies, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/blog\/ai-ml-the-key-to-combat-identity-fraud\/\">the best way forward to prevent these attacks is by incorporating advanced technologies such as AI\/ML<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>This would help\u00a0telcos\u00a0detect SIM Box frauds quickly,\u00a0as\u00a0early\u00a0as within 10 minutes of usage. Moreover, AI\/ML can help in\u00a0identifying\u00a0the various hidden complex patterns which otherwise would go undetected\u00a0through traditional rule-based\u00a0approaches. These\u00a0advanced\u00a0technologies can also enable\u00a0telcos\u00a0to\u00a0monitor the changing\u00a0behavior of the SIM\u00a0Box without\u00a0the need for\u00a0manual intervention.<\/p>\n<p>These technologies represent a key weapon in\u00a0the\u00a0telecom regulators\u2019 arsenal in their fight against fraud. This also becomes a vital step towards constructing sustainable and safe telecom ecosystems and would help\u00a0Telcos\u00a0in devising an advanced fraud detection\u00a0approach to address this crisis.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 22px;\"><span style=\"color: #00a1d6;\"><strong>To find out how you can take the next step towards fighting SIM Box fraud <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><a class=\"cta-btn\" href=\"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/fraud-management\/bypass-fraud\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Learn More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa owes much of its recent economic growth to the use of telecommunications\u00a0services.\u00a0However, over the past few years,\u00a0telcos\u00a0in\u00a0the region\u00a0have been hit by several telecom\u00a0frauds, most\u00a0notably\u00a0SIM Box\u00a0fraud,\u00a0also known as the interconnect bypass fraud. The unfortunate reality across the region is that SIM Box fraud continuous to\u00a0be\u00a0one of the major frauds affecting the dynamic telecom market in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":25159,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fraud-management"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25159"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dev.enki.studio\/test\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}