Flutterwave loses N11bn to security breach, funds transferred to many accounts

Popular Nigerian payment company, Flutterwave has been hit by another security breach, making it possible for hackers to divert N11 billion to various bank accounts.

The incident occurred a month after Flutterwave received a court order to recover another $24 million lost to unauthorised POS transactions.

According to reports, in April 2024, the hackers illegally transferred the N11 billion to many accounts.

The company revealed that it detected unauthorised activities that were not consistent with behaviours of its customers.

Flutterwave stated: “As is common in the financial services industry, there will always be attempts by bad actors to compromise the security of systems set up to protect and monitor services.

“In April, we detected unauthorised activities inconsistent with usual customer behaviour on one of our platforms used by a small subset of our customer base.”

TechCabal also spoke to an insider source that disclosed that the funds were transferred to several accounts across five financial institutions over four days.

The hackers were also alleged to have evaded detection by keeping the deposits below thresholds, so fraud checks are not prompted.

Nujinim Egwegbete-Odukwu, Flutterwave’s Head of Information and Security, while reacting to the news stated: “As leaders, we continue to invest heavily in our security infrastructure to ensure customers remain safe as they transact using Flutterwave.

"We are enhancing safety features on the affected platform and will be migrating some customers to another platform to benefit from the security enhancements.”

Flutterwave shuts down its creator platform

Disha, a platform for creators that Flutterwave acquired in 2021, was temporarily shut down in March, 2024.

The platform allows digital creators to curate, sell digital content, create portfolios and receive payments from their audience globally.

According to Flutterwave, the decision was necessary to re-evaluate its goals and align its vision to better serve the creative community.

BEB