MTN to deploy blockchain to tackle MoMo fraud-Sylvia -

MTN Ghana has announced a major technological shift aimed at strengthening the country’s digital finance ecosystem by deploying blockchain technology to combat fraud, enhance transparency, and rebuild public trust.

At the 2025 Fintech Stakeholder Forum in Accra, Mrs. Sylvia Otuo-Acheampong, Chief Product and Services Officer at MTN Mobile Money Limited (MoMo), said the company has developed a comprehensive framework to integrate blockchain into its mobile money operations, targeting critical areas such as transaction traceability, digital identity verification, and Know Your Customer (KYC) management.

Held under the theme “Harnessing Ghana’s Fintech Potential: Regulatory Frameworks for Digital Credit and Digital Assets,” the forum brought together regulators, fintech firms, banks, policy experts, and academia to deliberate on how Ghana can strengthen digital payments and ensure responsible innovation in the growing fintech space.

According to Mrs. Sylvia Otuo-Acheampong, Chief Product and Services Officer at MTN Mobile Money Limited (MoMo), the initiative represents a cornerstone in MTN’s broader digital transformation agenda for 2025 and beyond.

“Blockchain will help us embed trust in the system. It is not about cryptocurrency; it’s about leveraging technology to make transactions transparent, verifiable, and tamper-proof,” she said.

Blockchain beyond cryptocurrency

Executives at the forum took pains to clarify the distinction between blockchain and cryptocurrency, emphasizing that blockchain is not limited to digital assets but serves as a secure and auditable technology framework.

“When we talk about blockchain, many people immediately think of crypto, which is not licensed.

“But blockchain as a technology does much more. It allows us to design systems where transparency and traceability are built in from the start.

“The trust issues in digital finance can be solved through technology — and blockchain provides that foundation,” Mrs. Otuo-Acheampong explained.

Tackling mobile money fraud

Fraud has long plagued Ghana’s mobile money sector, eroding user confidence and costing both consumers and service providers significant losses each year.

MTN’s blockchain initiative directly targets this challenge through a distributed and immutable ledger that records every transaction from its origin to its destination.

“Every transaction can be traced,” the company explained. “Currently, when fraud occurs, and someone uses a teller or agent to cash out, tracing that transaction in real time can be extremely difficult. By the time the fraud is detected, the money is gone. Blockchain will change that by enabling full traceability — even down to the agent level,” She explained.

According to her, the immutable nature of blockchain means that once a transaction is recorded, it cannot be altered or deleted, ensuring data integrity and simplifying the process of auditing transactions and identifying fraudulent behavior.

Building a safer digital identity framework

Another major component of MTN’s blockchain plan is its focus on digital identity verification and KYC enhancement.

Mrs. Otuo-Acheampong said the blockchain-based smart contracts and interoperable databases would transform how customers’ identities are verified and managed, creating a safer environment for financial services.

“By introducing smart contracting, individuals will be able to enter their KYC information into secure, verified digital pools,” MTN stated. “When merged with multiple data sources, this will enrich credit scoring and improve risk assessment,” she added.

Such a system would prevent impersonation and fraudulent borrowing — two issues that have plagued Ghana’s micro-lending and digital credit sectors.

Real-world implementation underway

Mrs. Otuo-Acheampong stressed that these innovations are not theoretical but are already being developed in partnership with leading technology suppliers.

“This is part of a wider effort to align our operations with international standards for secure digital finance,” she said.

“We are already engaging technology partners to ensure that our blockchain framework is robust, scalable, and compliant with data protection regulations,” she assured.

Rebuilding public confidence in digital finance

According to data from the Bank of Ghana, more than 15,000 mobile money-related fraud incidents were reported in 2024, resulting in losses exceeding GH₵30 million.

Blockchain could dramatically reduce such figures by enabling real-time verification, secure audit trails, and interoperability between financial platforms.

MTN’s broader digital finance vision

The blockchain rollout forms part of MTN’s wider ambition to transform into a fully digital operator.

Over the past few years, MTN has invested heavily in digital platforms such as Ayoba, MoMo Advance, and mobile-based lending and insurance products.

By embedding blockchain into these systems, MTN hopes to set a new industry benchmark for data integrity, user protection, and operational transparency.

MTN’s initiative could be a turning point for Ghana’s fintech industry — signaling a shift from reactive fraud control to proactive digital trust-building.