Airtel Africa, which provides telecommunications and mobile payment services across 14 African countries, has introduced an AI-powered SPAM Alert service in Nigeria.
Airtel subscribers can use this service for free. With this new feature, smartphone and feature phone users can receive real-time alerts for suspected SPAM SMS messages. There is no need to download any additional apps, as Airtel Africa customers can automatically benefit from the service.
Initially starting in Nigeria, the service will be gradually rolled out to other countries where Airtel Africa operates.
This innovation is significant because smartphone penetration in Africa is rapidly increasing, and according to research by Quartz, as of 2019, nine of the top 20 countries with the highest SPAM rates are in Africa.
Hundreds of thousands of users frequently receive unsolicited SMS or calls, claiming to be from their network provider or the government, offering attractive benefits. T
hese SMS messages request users to click on various links and share personal information, allowing scammers to access their security details and commit fraud.
The Airtel AI Spam Alert Service analyzes more than 250 parameters in real-time without reading specific SMS messages. These parameters include the sender’s usage patterns, SMS frequency, and the geographical spread of targets.
The protection system is filtered in two layers: the first layer is at the network level, and the second layer is at the IT systems level. This system processes 1.5 billion messages in 2 milliseconds.
The software also alerts users about harmful internet links received via SMS. URLs of such malicious sites are stored in a centralized database, and when these sites are included in SMS messages, users are notified that the link is dangerous.