LETTER FROM THE CO-DIRECTORS
Assane Gueye is an associate teaching professor at Carnegie Mellon University Africa
Giulia Fanti is the Angel Jordan Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University
As we reflect on the accomplishments of 2024, we are proud of the progress made by the Upanzi Network. This year has been a transformative period, filled with challenges that tested our resilience and allowed us to scale to new heights. Our work advancing digital identity management, financial inclusion, and cybersecurity across Africa has yielded significant results. We’ve laid solid foundations for future innovation and are more committed than ever to fostering digital public goods and ensuring sustainable, inclusive growth. In 2024, we focused on scaling up our key projects in digital identity, financial inclusion, cybersecurity, and public health initiatives. Our collaborations with governments, academic institutions, and international organizations have bolstered our impact with real-world implementations of digital tools and platforms that drive economic participation and improve governance.
2024 marked the expansion of the Upanzi Network into a multi-university collaboration. We welcomed three partners to the network: Al Akhawayn University (Ifrane, Morocco), the University of Botswana (Gaborone, Botswana), and University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg, South Africa).
We have reached several research milestones this year. The team successfully deployed the MOSIP digital ID instance and integrated Mifos into Mojaloop, creating a seamless platform for cross-border financial transactions. We are proud to have designed an academic security operations center (SOC), featuring intelligent and customizable security information event management, and threat intelligence sharing. For this project, we have also developed a course curriculum that teaches students to monitor live systems, work with industry-standard software, and detect and respond to threats.
The Upanzi Network launched the Digital Experience Center, an interactive space that brings to life the latest digital technologies and their practical applications. The center highlights use cases and research in digital public goods and infrastructure, cybersecurity, data analytics, AI, public health, and agriculture.
The team participated in several key events showcasing our advancements this year. In March, we attended MOSIP Connect, where we demonstrated our work on customizing MOSIP for African digital identity solutions. We also participated in ID4Africa, one of the largest gatherings for digital identity management, where we shared insights on prototyping digital ID systems. In November, the Upanzi Network held the Symposium on Cybersecurity and Digital Identity in Africa in Ifrane, Morocco.
The team also held picoCTF-Africa sessions in Rwanda, Ethiopia, Zambia, and Botswana. We attended the ACM Internet Measurement Conference 2024, where we showcased the MIRA project. The 2024 FIRST & AfricaCERT Symposium: Africa and Arab Regions saw us showcase our Africa-wide threat intelligence research project. Attending the DPI Summit was a key milestone for the Upanzi Network, where we advocated for demonstration, research, and use cases within the digital public goods (DPG)/digital public infrastructure (DPI) ecosystem.
The Upanzi Network has expanded its reach through several new partnerships and policy panels. In 2024, we actively collaborated with the Ethiopian national ID program and attended the East African Digital Leaders Forum. We joined the global 50-in-5 campaign, strengthening our role as a key player in digital public goods and infrastructure. These partnerships have allowed us to influence policy and share best practices in deploying digital infrastructure at scale.
As we head into the new year, our focus remains on expanding our reach and deepening our impact. We aim to increase the number of university partners, host regional hackathons to foster innovation in digital identity, and continue our efforts to advance cybersecurity collaboration.
The Upanzi Network is poised to drive more inclusive, secure, and scalable digital transformation across Africa, and we invite you to join us on this journey. Together with our partners and supporters, we look forward to pushing the boundaries of digital transformation in 2025 and beyond.
Best wishes,
Assane Gueye and Giulia Fanti
UPANZI NETWORK 2024 FELLOWS
The Upanzi Network launched its fellows program in 2023, awarding fellowships to four Carnegie Mellon University Africa students to support their tuition costs. In 2024, the network welcomed a second cohort of fellows. These fellows have a strong passion for cybersecurity capacity building, tech entrepreneurship, and data analysis.
MARTHA KACHWEKA
Program: Master of Science in Information Technology
Home country: Tanzania
”I am passionate about using artificial intelligence and machine learning to address urgent health issues in Africa. I envision creating innovative solutions that not only enhance healthcare outcomes, but also prioritize the privacy and security of data. In today’s fastpaced world of AI, I am dedicated to developing responsible and secure data-driven systems that can genuinely transform healthcare delivery while safeguarding sensitive information. With the support of the Upanzi Network, I hope to contribute to building a healthier and more digitally secure future for Africa.”
6 In Other News CONTENTS
4 CMU-Africa Expands Digital Public Infrastructure Initiative
SAMUEL JOHNNY
Program: Master of Science in Information Technology
Home country: Nigeria
“This community of brilliant minds has directly contributed to developing my research skills. What has impressed me most about the Upanzi Network is the approach to digital public goods and their application to governance. The team’s dedication to developing open source digital solutions to improve governance structures in Africa is truly inspiring. While my focus remains on health systems, observing the Upanzi Network’s work in digital public goods governance gave me valuable insights into how digital solutions can be leveraged to enhance transparency, efficiency, and accessibility in various sectors.”
KAFUI AKPALU
Program: Master of Science in Information Technology
Home country: Ghana
“Working with the Upanzi Network has enhanced my cybersecurity skills, scalable application development, and design thinking expertise. In the Upanzi Lab at CMU-Africa, I am treated not as a student, but as a colleague, with the exact high expectations for quality and rigor. This perspective has instilled in me a commitment to delivering work of the highest standard, grounded in firstprinciples thinking. The experience has been invaluable to my academic and professional growth.”
CMU-AFRICA EXPANDS DIGITAL PUBLIC INFRASTRUCTURE INITIATIVE
The Upanzi Network will fund research projects in Morocco, Botswana, and South Africa, with plans for additional partnerships.
Carnegie Mellon University Africa will expand its digital public infrastructure initiative across the continent by partnering with laboratories at Al Akhawayn University (Ifrane, Morocco), the University of Botswana (Gaborone, Botswana), and University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg, South Africa). The network has plans to add additional partners on the continent.
Called the Upanzi Network, this Africa-based collaboration of engineering research labs will work toward a secure and resilient digital transformation by focusing on innovation across the entire pipeline of open standard technologies for the public good.
“In order to develop digital solutions that benefit
all Africans, it is essential that researchers from different African regions collaborate,” said Conrad Tucker, director of CMU-Africa and associate dean for international affairs-Africa in CMU’s College of Engineering. “There are no one-size-fits-all solutions on the continent; technologies need to be developed with local context and culture in mind.”
Each university partner lab has received a one-year seed grant for a research project related to the goals of the Upanzi Network. Projects will have impact in several sectors, including:
• Public service: A specialized lab will be created within the School of Science and Engineering at Al Akhawayn University dedicated to advancing public digital transformation. This lab will focus on the critical role that digital transformation can play in modern governance by enhancing the efficiency, transparency, and inclusiveness of public services.
• Agribusiness: Researchers in the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Botswana will explore how smart Internet of Things products can make farm management more efficient. They will focus on problems that farmers face in areas such as animal health, animal security, and water management. A workshop and competition will also be conducted to develop skills and knowledge to address such challenges for the youth.
Al Akhawayn University
University of Botswana
• Education: The University of the Witwatersrand’s Hub for Multilingual Education and Literacies and the Games, Artificial Intelligence and Culture labs will work together to advance technology-driven multilingual learning. They will focus on using multilingual learning as a tool to address social and educational limitations, as well as promote digital transformation.
“We are excited to build this partnership between African academic institutions so that the Upanzi Network can act as a neutral, trusted party in the development and implementation of digital public infrastructure,” said Assane Gueye, co-director of the Upanzi Network and associate teaching professor at CMU-Africa.
University of the Witwatersrand
Carnegie Mellon University Africa
IN OTHER NEWS
RESEARCH
A honeynet infrastructure to battle SMS scammers
Upanzi Network’s Bernard Odartei Lamptey, Assane Gueye, Edith Luhanga, Mohammed Seidu, and Karen Sowon have created an inexpensive honeynet infrastructure to intentionally draw in smishing messages from scammers so that they can collect more data about this cyber crime in order to develop ways that users can protect themselves. Their research was published as “Demo: A Low-Cost Honeynet Infrastructure For Smishing Data Collection” in COMPASS ‘24: Proceedings of the 7th ACM SIGCAS/SIGCHI Conference on Computing and Sustainable Societies.
Releasing private population analytics: How should we do it?
A team of Carnegie Mellon University researchers Aadyaa Maddi, Swadhin Routray, Alexander Goldberg, and Giulia Fanti conducted an empirical comparison of two existing classes of methods used to release differentially-private population analytics and established recommendations for organizations who want to release private population data. The article, “Benchmarking Private Population Data Release Mechanisms: Synthetic Data vs. TopDown,” was featured as a poster at the Fifth AAAI Workshop on Privacy-Preserving Artificial Intelligence in Vancouver, Canada.
Protecting software secrets in medical systems
Upanzi Network researchers Theoneste Byagutangaza, Junias Bonou, and Emmanuel Hirwa investigated 36 digital square global goods such as open source apps, software development kits, desktop apps, and web apps which are used in the health sector, and they found that 83 percent of these goods included passwords, private keys, authentication tokens, and other secrets that were at risk of being exposed.
Threat intelligence with AfricaCERT
The Upanzi Network partnered with AfricaCERT to establish a continent-wide honeynet for cybersecurity threat intelligence. The researchers aim to enhance Africa’s resilience against cyber threats by fostering
collaboration across the continent. By deploying honeypots strategically across diverse African networks, the project will provide a real-time, shared view of the threat landscape, equipping participating teams to identify, analyze, and respond to emerging cyber threats more effectively. Benin, Togo, and Ghana have already begun implementing honeynet deployments, and the network is actively seeking additional collaborations.
Responsible research
and innovation
in Sub-Saharan Africa
Upanzi Network’s Wambui Njogu, Ines Ineza, Patrick Iradukunda, and George Okeyo have developed a framework, the RRI Index, to quantitatively evaluate how well a research project uses responsible research and innovation (RRI) practices. These practices evaluate how ethically projects and software have been designed. The RRI Index is focused specifically on addresses the needs of users in the Global South.
CAPACITY BUILDING
picoCTF-Africa inspires participants to learn cybersecurity
From March 12–26, participants from around the world, including across Africa, competed in CMU CyLab Security and Privacy Institute’s “capture the flag” tournament
called picoCTF in which they learned about hacking and the principles of cybersecurity. The African leaderboard is in its third year, and the African teams are already a force to be reckoned with: the highest-scoring teams of the African leaderboard also scored within the top 50 teams of the overall competition. Of the over 18,000 participants in the international competition this year, 1,500 were from African countries.
The Upanzi Network and MicroSave Consulting (MSC) announce Digital ID Hackathon Africa
The Upanzi Network and MicroSave Consulting (MSC) have launched a series of regional hackathons for African university students to identify new and innovative use cases of digital ID across the continent. The hackathons will include an educational component for all participants. Before submitting their ideas, students will participate in a virtual course to give them an understanding and appreciation of digital ID, its key features, and technical knowledge of digital ID platforms. Once finalists are selected, students receive mentorship from digital ID experts for guidance and support as they develop their prototypes for potential real-world applications. The hackathons will conclude at the ID4Africa 2025 General Meeting being held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
THOUGHT LEADERSHIP
Upanzi Network co-directors selected for UN-led working group on DPI safeguards
Assane Gueye and Giulia Fanti have been selected by the United Nations Office of the Secretary-General Envoy on Technology to be part of a working group for the DPI Safeguards initiative. According to the UN office, the DPI Safeguards initiative is a multi-stakeholder process bringing together diverse voices to develop a safeguards framework to guide digital public infrastructure design and implementation around the world. The initiative aims to ensure that future DPI initiatives prioritize safety and security for all users. By setting the standard as a global community, countries can collectively increase trust, accelerate the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals, and potentially impact hundreds of millions of lives.
Gueye comments on the rise in electronic payment fraud in Business Day Nigeria
Assane Gueye commented on the rise in electronic payment fraud in Business Day Nigeria. Over the past five years, Nigerian bank customers have lost N59.33 billion, showing the desperate need for increased regulations and security measures. “We should be more intentional that these technologies will bring more good and not harm,” Gueye said.
Gueye featured in Forbes Afrique
Assane Gueye was interviewed by Forbes Afrique about artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. “Without question, life has moved into the digital realm, and with it, so has the issue of security. Today, anyone can attack a country remotely, with just a computer and a few algorithms. Unfortunately, Africa doesn’t have enough cybersecurity experts, and artificial intelligence can help fill this gap. So, a lot of effort — not just in Africa — is currently being put into seeing how AI can be used in the field of IT security. At present, one of the most active areas in research focuses on how AI can be used to better detect and respond to attacks,” he explained.
Fanti and Sowon suggest improving the way governments regulate technology
Giulia Fanti and Karen Sowon were among the coauthors of an article in Atlantic Council suggesting ways in which governments could more effectively regulate new technologies while avoiding setbacks. They detail efforts of governments around the world that have had unintended consequences affecting millions of people, and argue that these consequences may have been avoided had policymakers had approached the problems like products designers do, and balanced security, privacy, and usability.
