6 minute read
GUEST EDITOR
FINSERVE AFRICA: THE MILESTONES
Finserve Africa, Equity Group’s fintech subsidiary, drives the innovation and supports the Group’s digital and technological operations. It is well known for its groundbreaking products that include Equitel, Equity Group’s Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) as well as Jenga Payment Gateway and Jenga API.
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Jenga Payment Gateway (PGW), consolidates all payments- card & mobile wallets to the Jenga platform and presents one integration to businesses enabling them to receive payments across 180 countries. Merchants also have the option to get paid by sending simple payment links to their clients wherever they are. In all this, security is key, Finserve has taken critical steps to be globally at par by maintaining the highest security standards in payments that is PCI DSS Level 1 compliant. It fuses Azure cloud Security and firewall with secure socket layer (SSL) at application level to give you an all rounded secure solution.
to send money, buy, pay, manage their accounts, manage credit, withdraw cash as well as conduct KYC, CRB and AML queries. It also facilitates payments to mobile wallets and banks, including integrating single airtime APIs that purchase airtime across multiple telcos. The platform takes away the complexity of building and integration with simple guides, API references and dashboards to get businesses started in no time.
With the growing adoption of e-commerce, Finserve is working on a marketplace solution that will offer both consumers and merchants a secure platform to trade a variety of products and services. The platform will take care of every stage of the whole e-commerce value chain in order to ease barriers for businesses and enable them to tap into expanded markets and reach a wider customer pool, including facilitating cross border trade . Today’s consumer is not limited to local goods, but is spoilt for choice. They can choose a platform that facilitates cross border trade and that’s where Finserve’s marketplace comes in. With Equitel, Finserve’s flagship solution, customers get to enjoy convenience and greater value across mobile banking, telephony and internet services. Equitel provides customers the convenience to manage their bank accounts, enabling them to send money to any bank and any mobile network, pay for goods and services, apply and receive instant loans on their phones. Equitel also offers fast browsing speeds and competitive call rates of 1 bob per minute across all networks. With over 60 functionalities, the Equitel 4G SIM card gives customers freedom, choice and control at their fingertips. This year, Finserve won 2 Gold awards (Fintech Company of the year and Payment Solutions of the year) at the 4th Edition of the Kenya E-Commerce Awards 2022 held in Nairobi. The award recognizes Finserve’s continued commitment to innovation and customer-obsession.Finserve seeks to remain competitive globally while distinguishing itself as an innovator with futuristic solutions that will contribute to the ease of doing business in Africa.
CIO_API-PGW_AD.pdf 1 08/07/2022 07:29 Ready to take on this journey of growth and disruption with us? Talk to us on sales@finserve.africa or support@finserve.africa today.
ARTICLE by John Gichohi Senior Systems Engineer East Africa, Fortinet
Maintaining network visibility, orchestrating security policies, and consistently enforcing controls has become particularly challenging due to near-constant digital innovation over the last few years.
Efforts to remain competitive in today’s digital marketplace have led to fractured network perimeters and the expansion of the attack surface. To address these challenges, IT teams must move toward a zero trust approach to cybersecurity. Remote and Hybrid Work Connectivity Needs with Zero Trust
The strain on security teams was exacerbated during the massive work-from-home shift that forced most employees to essentially operate as a branch of one. Due to increased network complexity, the need for remote connections to critical corporate resources, and the introduction of both work and personal devices on unsecured home networks, VPNs alone were not enough to securely support all the connectivity needs of remote and hybrid workforces. The Zero Trust Approach to Cybersecurity Securing highly distributed networks – particularly those filled with remote workers, dynamically changing environments, and IoT devices– begins with a zero trust approach. This means trusting nothing and no one while also assuming any user or device that seeks network access has already been compromised. With zero trust, no devices are allowed to connect to corporate resources freely. Instead, any user or device requesting access must provide validated credentials. Even then, they are only permitted to access the minimally required resources needed to do their job. By denying all unvalidated traffic by default, bad actors and compromised devices can’t even ping the network to explore its resources, let alone the rest of the network.
Organisations must adopt two critical strategies to implement a true zero trust approach to cybersecurity: zero trust access (ZTA) and zero trust network access (ZTNA).
Zero Trust Access (ZTA)
The way ZTA works is by extending and expanding on the perimeter access controls already in place. This includes firewalls, authentication, authorisation, and accounting (AAA) services, as well as single sign-on (SSO). ZTA also adds additional levels of verification to this existing setup, such as tying access to the user’s role, physical geolocation, or even the time/day. All devices are likewise scrutinised to determine whether they are corporate or noncorporate assets, what software they are running, and whether they have the latest patches and required security solutions installed and enabled.
For network-connected devices without an end-user, such as printers, secured entryways, security cameras, HVAC systems, and other IoT solutions, a ZTA solution should also include network access control (NAC) technology for discovery, authentication, and control, in addition to also applying the same zero trust principle of least access. Authenticating every device and user provides IT teams with up-todate network visibility and control, enabling easy identification of anything suspicious and allowing them to take appropriate countermeasures as needed.
Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA)
As the new addition to the zero trust model, ZTNA is designed for organisations and users who rely on applications. With ZTNA, any users connecting to the network on any device and from any location – including inside and outside the corporate network – are authenticated and granted access based on policy, with each user receiving the same level of protection. ZTNA provides secure access to applications regardless of whether they are deployed in data centers or in private or public clouds. Once authenticated, users are granted access only to the requested application. The authentication process is dynamic, seamless, and transparent to the user unless they are denied access to something they do not have permission for.
Zero Trust is Vital
IT leaders have been looking for ways to maintain network control and visibility as the network edge evolves and the threat landscape expands. The changes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic made the need for consistent network visibility and access control even more pressing. With remote work likely here to stay even as offices open up around the world, and with network complexity ever on the rise, IT and security teams must implement zero trust protections and controls to enable robust cybersecurity. Fortinet’s Zero-Trust Access framework allows organizations to identify, authenticate, and monitor users and devices on and off the network.
