Virtual Meetings have exploded in recent months with the Coronavirus outbreak forcing people to start working and socializing from home. Video-calling services have seen a sharp rise during the coronavirus pandemic with options like Zoom and its daily active users growing to 300 million in April.

Another popular option, the Houseparty, owned by Fortnite-maker Epic Games has been downloaded more than two million times as at the beginning of March and other apps, such as Microsoft Teams, offer premium features for free.

With the current trend and the need to meet the demands of teleconferencing, Facebook is jumping into video chat game with its product feature, Messenger Rooms, a new feature that will allow up to 50 people to take part in a video chat, even if they don’t have Facebook accounts.

Facebook has had a long and notorious history of expanding its features to emulate major competitors, from first launching stories on Instagram in 2016 as a clone of Snapchat. Now Facebook wants more of the video market and is trying to take on the now popular video sharing platform, Zoom (ZM).

(READ MORE: Google, Facebook extend remote working for employees)

Previously, the messenger video calls were limited to eight people but with this new video feature ‘Messenger Rooms,’ users can currently host a meeting with up 50 people at once with no time limit on its messenger app, it will also be added to the company’s other applications- WhatsApp will see that the maximum number of people who can simultaneously join a video call will increase from four to eight.

This new feature will be available on beta versions of WhatsApp for both Android and iOS. For making a video call with up to eight people, your WhatsApp must be running version 2.20.133 on Android and version 2.20.50.25 on iOS. The other condition is, the other participants that you’re looking to video and voice call, must also have the same beta version of WhatsApp running on their devices.

What’s the Catch?

Although these Messenger Rooms won’t be completely private, WhatsApp video and voice calls with up to eight people, will be end-to-end encrypted so no one else can view or listen in on private conversations, not even Facebook. Basically, end-to-end encryption is one of the main Unique Selling Points (USP) of the new video feature. Facebook is working to bring the security protocol to Messenger and Instagram Direct, so users will potentially be able to cross-platform chat across all these services one day, it’s easier said than done.

Like house party, the messenger rooms will let people drop in and out of the group video chats while the “room” is open just the way people have the ability to bump into each other in the physical world. Another catch of the new video feature is that users can create a Messenger Room that will be able to keep their room private, block unwanted participants, and send invitations to people who are not on Facebook.

Facebook is working to prevent the reoccurring issues its competitor’s faced like the “Zoombombing problem,” which let uninvited guests drop into video calls to abuse participants or share pornography.  The company is working with cryptographers to make the links for the Messenger Rooms difficult for hackers to guess. Although, publicly discoverable rooms will be listed at the top of the Facebook news feed and chats will not be end-to-end encrypted. Possibly, this would be one of the reasons why Facebook may successfully take on Zoom with its security and end-to-end encrypted tactics.

Other features of the new video feature include:

• The ability to add eight people to a WhatsApp video call – up from four.
• The return of “Live With”, which lets users host Facebook Live streams with another person, to bring guests or performers on to their show.
• The ability to watch Instagram live videos on desktop computers.
• Participants will be able to use augmented reality filters and change their background in real-time.

The importance of digital literacy in the furtherance of Nigeria’s economic growth is a topic that has proven to be extremely paramount especially in these forced changing times.

Truth is, talent training outlets are not in short supply in Nigeria; from Decagon to Learn Factory; there are a number of programmes offering advanced and specialized digital literacy skills in fields like software development, machine learning etc.

As a matter of fact, Nigeria has set a 95% digital literacy target for the next ten years under a Digital Economy Strategy in order to ramp up the contributions of the ICT sector to the Nigerian economy and last year, the sector accounted for 13.8% of the nation’s GDP which is more than the oil and gas sector on which the country has previously been heavily reliant.

The Lagos State Government since this pandemic collaborated with Microsoft Office to train 18,000 secondary school teachers on digital literacy in order to equip, train, and engage them to deliver on their duties through technology during this lockdown period.

(READ MORE: Digital financial services amid COVID-19)

However, digital financial literacy is a niche that still has not become mainstream as many would assume. For the reason of the evident gap in the country, we have companies like NetPlusDotCom organizing webinars to educate Nigerians on the importance of an inevitable shift to digital payments and financing post-COVID-19.

Unfortunately, there are a few challenges hindering the growth of digital financial literacy in Nigeria, they include:

• Policy Implementation: Already set regulations geared towards promoting digital literacy are not readily implemented.
• The regular school curriculum does not reflect a component of digital literacy skills that would be relevant in the future of work.
• High costs of infrastructures such as the Internet and power is one of the challenges faced in promoting digital financial literacy in Nigeria.
• There is a digital divide due to the existence of unreached communities who are not aware of the concept of digital literacy.
• Digital literacy has been termed too difficult to conceptualize resulting in unnecessary complexity for the understanding of the process to a layman.
• Resistance to Change: The general attitude of people towards change and what digital literacy offers, is a hindrance in promoting digital financial literacy.
• Skepticism of many unenlightened Nigerians.

(READ MORE: Facebook is building $1 billion high speed internet across Africa)

Proposed Solutions

• More citizen engagement and awareness of existing and new policies on digital literacy.
• Investment in research and development by the government and other institutions to help Nigerians be more conversant on international standards as it concerns promoting digital literacy.
• There should be a collaboration between organizations whose works are centered on digital literacy with schools in actualizing a more robust curriculum.
• The government should provide tax incentives/ reliefs for telecoms to enable them to reduce the costs of data. Telecoms can also provide ICT parks to allow for access to the internet.
• On inclusion, collaboration between Government, Multilateral organizations, and civil society groups should be considered to reach underserved communities possibly in the local language so as to avoid the language barrier.
• To ward off resistance to change, there should be orientation programs on the need and importance of digital literacy using the bottom-top approach of reaching out to grass-root individuals.

Some time ago, we tried to debunk some myths about the 5G network being the cause of many health challenges, including the current pandemic. But we did not address the benefits to the increasing emergence of digitalized experiences, or the tech space as a whole.

Huawei’s Vice President of Corporate Strategy, Bill Genovese, in an interview, explained that the digital evolution of business models worldwide and other emerging technologies would drive the 5G adoption.

Undoubtedly, the digital evolution of industries globally is unceasing, especially in the financial services sector. The traditional banking model, which has changed forever, has been driven by new and innovative technologies, new digitally-led businesses entering the sector, and the ever-evolving needs as consumers.

According to Genovese, we are already entrenched in the next generation of financial services, an environment in which banking has shifted from a product-driven ethos to being about building a lifestyle, and we absolutely agree with this.

READ ALSO: Survey indicates bots are the next big thing Nigerian Businesses

Fintech and the 5G network

Genovese explained how the conditions that led to market evolution, such as mobile and new technology solutions in line with shifting consumer expectations, could place fintech at the top of the 5G revolution.

(READ MORE: 7 female executives under 40 in FinTech)

5G can provide faster, cheaper, and better services for more people, but it’s possible only through the adoption of mobile and digital next-generation financial services that will apply emerging technologies.

Fintech is going to drive 5G, not the other way around. 5G will enable network downloads as fast as 20 gigabits, also accelerating the ability of machines to share data. Ultimately, this means that every device in a specific urban area can be connected.

If we considered emerging markets like Nigeria where in some parts, the 3G network is lacking or it is very limited or no access to bank branches, a leapfrog into 5G would mean digital banks needing virtual tellers, virtual advisors, and micro branches, all of which would require higher bandwidth and latency.

READ MORE: Why COVID-19 is linked to 5G launch

According to Genovese, 5G is not occurring in a vacuum; rather, it is a part of a converging OS factor that fintech could be at the centre of, as consumers will always be in need of service offerings in payments, credit/lending, and deposits.

However, all this is still a long way from now. Asides from the global focus on stopping the pandemic, Coronavirus, the 5G network is still hindered from going mainstream by its inability to travel long distances or even penetrate most building structures.