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Tokyo Game Show 2020 Cancelled due to COVID-19

The organisers of the Tokyo Game Show have announced that this year’s event has been cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. TGS 2020 was scheduled to take place from 24 to 27 September at the Makuhari Messe convention centre just outside of Tokyo, Japan. Now, the organisers are planning to host an online event instead. The Verge reports that this is the first-ever time TGS has faced cancellation since the convention began in 1996. Sadly, this news won’t come as a surprise to anyone. Almost every in-person gaming event this year has been struck from the calendar, including E3 and Gamescom, the biggest shows in the US and Europe respectively. TGS 2020 was likely to have gained a great deal of attention this year in comparison to an average year because of its status as the last major trade ...

F5 Networks Acquires Shape Security

F5 Networks – a company that helps make apps operate faster, smarter and safer for the world’s largest businesses, service providers, governments and consumer brands – has completed its acquisition of Shape Security, a leader in fraud and abuse prevention. Marcel Fouché, Networking and Storage General Manager at value-added distributor Networks Unlimited Africa, a channel partner of F5 in sub-Saharan Africa, comments: “A number of experts view this merger and acquisition as being a game-changer for comprehensive application security.” “The purchase of Shape Security adds protection from automated attacks, botnets, and targeted fraud to F5’s world-class portfolio of application services in order to further protect customers’ digital experiences. This agreement will accelerate F5’s growth mo...

Doing Business in a Post-Lockdown World

Sourced from Business News Daily At the beginning of March, few anticipated the significant impact the COVID-19 pandemic would have on the lives of all South Africans. As the gradual easing of the strict lockdown conditions continues, thoughts turn to how companies will begin their recovery. Ian McAlister, GM of CRS Technologies, looks at what to expect. From Friday 1 May, South Africa transitioned to Level 4 lockdown conditions which will result in several more industries resuming operations, albeit in a limited capacity. And while all the details around operational issues are still to be confirmed, expectations are that at least 1.5 million South Africans will be returning to work. In part, this is designed to get the economy back up and running following several weeks of virtual non-act...

HPE Offers Digital Learning Platform to all South Africans

Sourced from Silicon Angle Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has announced that it will give 30 days free access to the company’s Learning-as-a-Service Platform – provided users register before the end of May 2020. Offering around 5000 hours of training across numerous modules, the HPE Digital Learner Platform acts as a global example of how digital learning is exploring access to education and skills. “As a prominent global edge-to-cloud Platform-as-a-Service provider, HPE is acutely aware that COVID-19 has increased the pressure on technology companies to innovate ever-more effective remote operability”, says Renay Rampersadh, Education Manager at HPE South Africa. “COVID-19 has not only cast the demand for remote capability into stark relief, but has also highlighted the shortage of skil...

‘Animal Crossing’ Boosts Nintendo’s Profits as Videogame Demand Soars

Sourced from WccfTech. The success of the Nintendo Switch during the worldwide pandemic has propelled Japanese entertainment company to a stand-out year. Nintendo says that it had made 352-billion yen ($3.3-billion) in operating profit for the fiscal year ending in March – a 41% surge from a year ago. Profit in the three months leading to March more than tripled compared with the previous quarter. Sales were driven in a large part to the massive success of the Nintendo’s Animal Crossing: New Horizons – a game set on an island utopia where players can interact online and visit each other’s island. During the first six weeks of the game’s release, the company sold more than 12-million units of the game. Animal Crossing and the hardware it runs on, the Nintendo Switch game console, have been ...

Gozem Benin Integrates Etisalat Moov Money into App

Gozem has officially integrated Etisalat Benin’s mobile money capabilities to its app.  Essentially, the integration means that Gozem customers can now use Moov Money to safely top up their Gozem wallets and take trips without cash. This move could see hundreds of Gozem users in Benin benefiting from the simplicity and security of Moov Money at a time when the need for a cashless society is a growing trend and a global strategic imperative. “In addition to existing payment options offered in our app, Gozem users can now alsobenefit from the security and convenience of paying with Moov Money. We are proud tocontinually improve our service offering and work alongside Moov Benin to offer ourcustomers more choice and convenience,” says Pierrick Houée, Country Manager for GozemBenin. Moov ...

Global VPN Use Exploded in March

With millions working from home, the COVID-19 pandemic has seen the global usage of VPN demand swell. Demand for commercial VPNs (Virtual Private Networks) in the US jumped by 41% between 13 March and 23 March according to research from Top10VPN.com, a VPN research and testing company in the U.K. Network World writes that VPNs were already a growing industry before the coronavirus outbreak struck the world and the subsequent shutdown of workplaces. The global VPN market was forecast to grow 12% year-on-year and be worth $70-billion by 2026, according to a Global Market Insights 2020 survey. North America was forecast to remain the leader in VPN usage, with around 30% market share. Top10VPN.com found global VPN demand increased by 41% over the second half of March and remains 22% higher tha...

Mukuru Acquires Malawian Fintech Zoona

Image sourced from Mukuru Mukuru, one of the largest international money operators and remittance companies in Africa, has confirmed that it has acquired Zoona Malawi’s operational assets along with the technology systems that support its Malawian operations. Zoona, which has worked with Mukuru for four years as a trusted partner, is an Africa-based fintech that enables entrepreneurs to bring safe and reliable financial services to underserved communities in Malawi and elsewhere. “Mukuru empowers Africa’s financially underserved migrant workers to be included in the formal financial ecosystem and to move money in a convenient, safe and affordable way,” says Andy Jury, CEO, Mukuru. “This acquisition will bring the benefits of our extensive products and cutting-edge technology to the citizen...

Nedbank to Offer Free Online Education and Skills Based Courses

Image sourced from Nedbank Nedbank has announced that it is partnering with global educational institution Shaw Academy to offer free online interactive courses to its customers during the COVID-19 pandemic. With 1 million job losses predicted as a result of the current economic crisis, Nedbank hopes this move will see hundreds of customers given access to a range of subjects focused on developing practical skills such as finance, photography, health and fitness, marketing, technology, design, beauty, music and business. During a period where people both have more time on their hands and where existing experience is not necessarily enough to ensure job security, providing a means for them to reskill or upskill – potentially creating new employment opportunities – is particularly relevant. ...

Children’s Internet Activity Increases by 200% During Lockdown

South African children have become more active on the Internet as the national lockdown progresses. Comparing their activity in the first week of January and the last week of March, the overall number of website visits grew by 200%. This became evident from the analysis of Kaspersky Safe Kids parental control module of Q1 2020. Children’s activity on the Internet is as important nowadays as their behaviour and social environment outside. This is why it is crucial to help a child to navigate through the information that surrounds them on the web, making sure that the experience is positive. During the worldwide lockdown, children are prone to look for entertainment online more than ever, so this period has shown some important changes in their behaviour that correlated with the increase in ...

Keep VPNs Safe from Cyber Attacks during Lockdown

Sourced from International IDEA If cybercrime were a country, it would have the 13th highest gross domestic product (GDP) in the world, with large multi-national operations earning more than US$1 billion annually. This is according to the recently-released 2H 2019 NETSCOUT Threat Intelligence Report, which says that this gives cybercriminals plenty of motivation to continue unleashing an onslaught of different types of attacks on the world – including phishing, distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, ransomware and many other forms of malicious malware. And that was just last year – where are we at now that we’re four months into 2020? “This year,” says Bryan Hamman, Regional Director at NETSCOUT, a leading provider of service assurance, security and business analytics, “cybercrimina...

Microsoft Introduces New Surface Devices

Microsoft has introduced its latest Surface range which includes the new Surface Go 2, Surface Book 3, Surface Headphones 2 and Surface Earbuds. The tech goliath says that this range was designed to help users navigate the current environment which sees more people turning to Windows PCs than ever. In fact, over 4 trillion minutes are being spent on Windows 10 a month, a 75% increase year on year. “The way we work, connect and learn continues to change right in front of us. Our devices have become our window to the world – our office, our school and our social space,” says Panos Panay, Chief Product Officer for Windows and Devices at Microsoft. “It’s not just the pull of the larger screen and better keyboard, but the versatility of a device that runs the software we need and games and ente...