Ethiopia’s digital finance sector is experiencing unprecedented growth, compressing decades of traditional financial evolution into a matter of months. However, industry regulators and experts warn that this rapid transformation is concurrently attracting severe cyber threats and sophisticated financial fraud, posing a significant challenge to the nation’s economic ecosystem.
Speaking at the Huawei Finance Summit 2026 held today at the Sheraton Addis under the theme “Advancing Fintelligence, Shaping Smarter Ethiopia Finance,” key stakeholders evaluated the sector’s trajectory. The high-level event brought together prominent industry actors, including Eric Yuan, CEO of Huawei Ethiopia PLC, and Dr. Naol Adissu, Senior Technology Advisor to the Governor of the National Bank of Ethiopia.
Highlighting the digital transaction boom, Dr. Naol Adissu revealed that nearly 24 billion digital financial transactions were recorded in the country over the past nine months alone. Despite this landmark achievement, he cautioned that Ethiopia has now become a prime target for high-level cyberattacks, urging domestic financial institutions to robustly upgrade their defensive capabilities and readiness.
The central bank advisor also raised critical concerns regarding data sovereignty, pointing out that major global tech conglomerates typically store African user data in external datacenters outside the continent. To mitigate potential national security implications, Dr. Adissu emphasized the urgent need to prioritize local data and infrastructure sovereignty, advocating for utilitarian innovations that defend consumer rights.
In response to these systemic challenges, Huawei Ethiopia CEO Eric Yuan reaffirmed the multinational’s commitment to reinforcing the nation’s financial architecture. Huawei representatives pledged to continuously support local financial institutions in constructing reliable, state-of-the-art digital infrastructure enhanced by Artificial Intelligence (AI) to ensure both rapid growth and robust security.