Safaricom, a major telecommunications provider in Kenya, has issued a statement on the current problem with their services, following numerous customer complaints that their M-Pesa mobile money wallets were ‘transacted’ without their permission.
Digital video artist Alvan Love initially noticed the problem after his phone tried “sending money on its own” without his permission or instruction and took to Twitter to express his confusion and concern.
“Safaricom! Insecure now! As of right now, my phone is attempting to (send) money on its own. In the beginning, there was an alert (your sim made an audible sound asking if you wanted to accept or deny). Once I clicked yes, the entire M-Pesa menu appeared and began functioning on its own.
This company, Safaricom PLC, Like, what the heck is going on here? I’ve since drained it completely,” the former Tusker Project Fame candidate wrote.
After this, several other users of his thread disclosed that they, too, had received the aforementioned prompt from their mobile money wallets, prompting widespread panic over the prospect of having their funds stolen.
Internet users commented on how bizarre it was to check your phone and find it in the M-Pesa section when they were sure they hadn’t left it there.
However, Safaricom is assuring its customers that nothing of the sort is happening and that the alerts were simply a system error.
In response to Alvan Love’s statement, the business explained that the activation of the M-Pesa menu was the result of a recent change to the M-Pesa withdrawal menu.
Saying something like, “Hello Alvan, Please accept our deepest condolences for the trouble you’ve had using our M-Pesa service.
This problem arose because of an upgrade to the M-Pesa withdrawal option that was pushed out to users without adequate testing. In this case, your M-Pesa account was not accessed because no PIN was requested. In any case, I appreciate it. “AO,” said Safaricom’s social media team. Although Internet users are still wary, the telecom company has assured them their money is secure.
