• The DCB Index from Evina and Telecoming for 2022 was released at the end of 2022.
• The index shows strong growth and innovation in the DCB space in the Middle East and Africa region.
• There is much work to be done as regards fraud prevention in the space which will help to drive adoption.

Direct Carrier Billing (DCB) is the ability to allow customers to pay for services or even goods using airtime or adding it to their carrier’s bill for the month. The practice has become rather popular in South Africa and that trend has been observed across the African continent.

This is according to Evina and Telecoming which published the DCB Index toward the end of 2022. The index looks at countries in the Middle East and Africa region and ranks them. These rankings are determined by the ability for the carrier to prevent DCB related fraud, innovation in the DCB space, penetration of DCB in the market and the growth potential of this market. Countries are ranked on a scale from one to five where one is the lowest and five the highest.

The market that ranks the highest overall is South Africa with a rating of 3.4 according to Evina and Telcoming’s report.

The thing holding SA’s DCB aspirations back is, unfortunately, fraud. While carriers have made provisions to combat fraud, more must be done to protect this payment ecosystem.

“For the South African Carrier Billing ecosystem to thrive, all players must do two things: implement the right cybersecurity protection and continue promoting innovation so that businesses can earn new revenues by offering new digital and personalized uses,” reads the report.

Morocco, which scored 3.3 just behind South Africa, is also hampered by fraud in the DCB space. However, Morocco and DR Congo saw massive gains in their placement thanks to both increased DCB deployment and cybersecurity measures being implemented.

“The overall fraud prevention of mobile players across the Middle East and African region has increased by 0.2 compared to 2021, showing a collective willingness to safeguard the powerful payment tool that is Direct Carrier Billing,” explains chief executive officer at Evina, David Lotfi.

“Businesses have yet to understand that DCB can become even more powerful than credit cards and that mobile operators already have all the advantages to elevate DCB and become the biggest fintech companies. DCB is without a doubt a major opportunity for the African continent alongside mobile money, if protected with the right cybersecurity solutions,” adds Lotfi.

While fraud prevention has improved slightly, 0.2 points is not good enough and more needs to be done to protect DCB payments. This is especially important when we look at how innovation is growing in this space. Where fraud prevention only increased 0.2 points, innovation increased 0.3 points year-on-year.

Payments for subscriptions, especially for sports, are driving adoption of the payment method. That having been said, adoption only increased 0.1 points between 2021 and 2022. This is down to carriers simply not offering the payment method as well as a lack of adoption from consumers. Whether fraud prevention and other security measures will be enough to drive this adoption remains to be seen.

The country which ranks lowest on Evina and Telecoming’s index is Mali with a score of 1.9.

“In Mali, citizens are used to digital payments such as mobile money. Direct Carrier Billing is present but has little potential for development to date due to the low overall penetration
of smartphones. In order to increase its future value, mobile players in the country need to promote innovation and implement the right technologies to combat fraud,” reads the report.

[Image – SmallmanA on Pixabay]