On Monday, 2 July 2018, at around 5pm, two employees of Huawei Uganda (a contractor of MTN Uganda) were kidnapped from MTN Towers, Hannington Road by heavily armed men in civilian clothing who claimed to be Internal Security Organisation (ISO) agents. The kidnapped individuals were illegally detained in an un-gazetted area and later forced to grant unauthorised physical access to the MTN Uganda’s Data Centre at Mutundwe.
At the Data Centre, there were several attempts by the intruders, to log into MTN Uganda’s servers over a period of two hours. The efforts were unsuccessful because of MTN Uganda’s robust information security systems and no data was accessed or compromised by the intruders. These incidents were captured on our CCTV cameras and the footage has been shared with the police.
The incident was reported to the Minister of Security and the Chief of Military Intelligence. The intruders subsequently withdrew from the Data Centre around midnight.
MTN (U) formally reported the matter to the Uganda Communication Commission. MTN Uganda also opened a case at CID Headquarters- Kibuli under reference number GEF 727/2018.
MTN (U) takes this criminal incident seriously and is working with the government of Uganda to establish the identity and motive of the perpetrators and bring them to account.
Contrary to various print and social media reports, MTN Uganda is not aware of any investigation into alleged breach of national security involving it or tax evasion on its part.
MTN (U) is committed to collaborating with the Uganda Police and other security agencies as they investigate this incident.
– Issued by Chairman, MTN Uganda.
