Policies, regulations and procedures and their effects on mobile money systems in Uganda

Abstract

The introduction of mobile money systems in emerging economies has enabled the would-be unbanked population to gain access to financial services. The number of mobile money users and value of transactions is on the increase. This rapid growth of mobile money services and value transactions in emerging economies is attributed to the light-touch regulatory framework which allows minimal limitations on who should operate mobile money system and few restrictions on who can function as an agent. These increases both in services and transactions indicate that mobile money systems hold a lot of valuable customer financial information that needs to be jealously protected against information breaches and abuse by the various stakeholders in the mobile money ecosystem. Taking an interpretive qualitative approach, Activity Theory (AT) has been used to analyse the mobile money management activities focusing on information security policies, regulations and procedures. In order to comprehend the aspects revealed by the Activity Theory analysis that raise information security management concerns in mobile money operations, Mobile Network Operator (MNO) management issues, in terms of the security of mobile money operations, are detailed. Our findings look at the reasons given by various stakeholders for information security management gaps in mobile money operations in emerging economies. Our findings disclose the roles of MNO staff, who are not information security experts, in the development and compliance monitoring of policies, regulations and procedures related to the safety of financial information in mobile money systems.