TECHNOLOGY

After a nine-month hiatus, Uber says, its autonomous vehicles are now safer. Uber took its self-driving cars off the road last March, after a fatal accident, the first known pedestrian death caused by a vehicle in full autonomous mode. After that, Uber’s self-driving program fell under the scrutiny of local police, lawmakers and federal investigators. Now the company says it’s ready to put its self-driving fleet back ...

Facebook is building a cryptocurrency designed to make it easier to transfer money on WhatsApp, according to Bloomberg. The currency will reportedly be focused on India and allowing Indian workers abroad to send money back home, something that other Bitcoin startups have already been working to solve given the difficult and expensive process for international transfers. Facebook has been looking to develop its own ...

Joshua Otoo, a young entrepreneur has created a mobile application that allows users to control their home appliances remotely on their smart devices called “the Smart Home System”. The Smart home system is a system which allows a house owner or business to control their lighting systems, electrical appliances from wherever they are, using their smart phone. They can also ...

The daughter of the founder of Chinese telecoms giant Huawei has been arrested in Canada and faces extradition to the United States. Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s chief financial officer and deputy chair, was arrested in Vancouver on 1 December. Details of the arrest have not been released but the US has been investigating Huawei over possible violation of sanctions against Iran. ...

The issue of illicit financial flows is not new; however, the increasing complexity of the digital economy and fast-evolving technologies in the last few decades is changing the landscape of this problem. The threat posed by the 21st-century cybercriminal in earning money illegally and transferring it across borders with a simple mouse click was realised when a syndicate of 26 ...

The United States Embassy in Ghana has described as “false” a communiqué warning of the existence of two con men in some six African countries duping unsuspecting citizens in those countries under the guise of cryptocurrency investment. The communique’ purportedly authored by John P. Hooks, Head of the United States’ Cyber Crime Unit said: “I would like to inform the ...

Parliament has pulled the breaks on a US$12m drone technology expected to distribute blood products in very remote areas of the country where quality healthcare delivery is hard to reach. This follows the discovery of some legal and regulatory issues in the contractual agreement between the Government of the Republic of Ghana, represented by the Ministry of Health and Fly ...

Nigeria’s largest online library which was launched in Lagos last October has gained over two thousand members. The platform by ‘Bambooks’ Limited is aimed at empowering local authors to get their works across a larger audience and make some money. Founder and CEO of ‘Bambooks’, Ugo Okoye told Africanews that his team saw a big opportunity to bring African content ...

UK researchers have developed an early warning system to prevent the crops of African farmers from being devastated. The Pest Risk Information Service (Prise) combines temperature data and weather forecasts with computer models. It then sends farmers a mobile phone alert so that they can take precautions. It is hoped that the system will boost yields and increase farm incomes ...

Government has revealed it will launch a cyber security fund in 2019 to ensure there is enough funds to fight the menace. This comes on the back of the roll out of the Cyber Security Guidelines for the financial sector by the Central Bank. Statistics from the cybercrime unit of the CID revealed that the country has lost about 25milllion ...