Flutterwave debunks losing N2.9bn to hackers

By Olumide David

African fintech unicorn Flutterwave has denied losing the sum of N2,949,557,867 to hackers.

It was earlier reported over the weekend that hackers stole the sum of N2,949,557,867, from the accounts of the company and over 300 customers were affected by the fraudulent act.

Meanwhile, the company said  nothing of such happened, on Sunday.

The company said, “We want to reassure you that Flutterwave has not been hacked. As a financial institution, we monitor transactions through our transaction monitoring systems and 24-hour fraud desk and review any suspicious activity.

“We collaborate with other financial institutions and law enforcement agencies to keep our ecosystem safe and secure.

“During a routine check of our transaction monitoring system, we identified an unusual trend of transactions on some users’ profiles.

“Our team immediately launched a review (in line with our standard operating procedure), which revealed that some users who had not activated some of our recommended security settings might have been susceptible.

“We want to confirm that no user lost any funds, and we take pride in the fact that our security measures were able to address the issue before any harm could be done to our users. We want to reassure you that Flutterwave has not been hacked,” Flutterwave said.

However, the tech giant’s counsel, Albert Onimole, had notified the case to the Deputy Commissioner of Police, State Criminal Intelligence Department, Panti, Yaba.

According to Onimole’s letter, the hack on Flutterwave’s accounts occurred about some weeks ago revealing that the said sum was initially transferred to 28 accounts in 63 transactions.

Although the accounts that received the money were listed, the police are yet to freeze the receiving accounts to prevent the money being moved.

According to Flutterwave, some commercial banks allowed the money to be moved to other accounts, widening the money trail.