South African telco MTN said on Tueday that its API marketplace Chenosis is partnering with TransUnion Africa to launch a solution that uses mobile phone call data records (CDRs) to assess credit scores for people seeking access to financial services.
The TransUnion Telco Data Score solution correlates CDRs – which reflect patterns in mobile phone network usage behaviour – to an individual’s financial behaviour as a proxy for financial reliability.
The resulting score enables lenders to accurately assess new-to-credit (NTC) consumers by predicting user behaviour and ensuring credit users at risk of default are not overexposed and can be effectively supported throughout their credit journey, MTN said.
TransUnion Africa said the Telco Data Score solution will expand access to safe, affordable credit, which will help millions of South Africans with limited or no formal credit history gain access to financial services.
According to TransUnion Africa, over 1.4 million credit-invisible South Africans open new credit accounts each year, but traditional scoring models often fail to assess this segment accurately, leaving over 16 million adults outside the formal credit system. TransUnion Africa also said that over a third of NTC consumers are under 25, many of whom are new to the workforce and often use credit to buy clothing for work.
TransUnion Africa CEO Lee Naik said that successfully integrating these and other excluded consumers into the economy could add approximately R173 billion to South Africa’s GDP.
“With over 500 million people across the continent excluded from formal financial systems, the scale of the challenge is undeniable,” Naik said in a statement. “Traditional data models fail to reflect the realities of African consumers, leaving millions without access to credit and the opportunities it enables.”
Naik said the TransUnion Telco Data Score helps the company harness mobile data at scale. “In doing so, we’re not only expanding access to credit, but we’re also unlocking economic potential, accelerating inclusive growth, and reshaping the future of finance across the continent.”
MTN added that the use of CDR data is subject to explicit consumer consent. MTN is responsible for consent management and will ensure that Chenosis facilitates the connection between MTN’s data ecosystem and partners like TransUnion in a secure and scalable manner in compliance with South Africa’s Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA), said MTN Group’s group chief commercial officer Selorm Adadevoh.
“We are committed to ensuring that data is used responsibly, with the customer’s interests at the forefront,” he said. “This is a model of what responsible innovation can look like.”
