Michael Atingi-Ego, the Governor of the Bank of Uganda (BoU), has opened up about his daily work routine of managing the national monetary policy and currency, which often involves an endless battle with online scammers. Atingi revealed that he personally sifts through a flood of emails daily, some of which are blatant scams targeting his position. In an interview with Grab a Coffee Podcast, Atingi-Ego shared his meticulous approach to managing correspondence, saying that this is usually his first task of his day that often continues until the last task of the night. “I usually clear all my emails before going to sleep,” he said, explaining that he sometimes wakes to a flood of messages overnight. He personally reads and replies to each email, ensuring none are left unaddressed. Staying alert and on the lookout for criminal elements in his inbox, he said, can be draining. “Some of the emails push me to internalise what their real objective is. One of the things I pray about is the gift of discernment. With it, you can easily tell what the objective of an email sender is,” he said. One red flag he frequently encounters is unsolicited proposals involving vast sums of money. "Someone says, ‘…we want to give the Government of Uganda $5 billion to undertake this investment…’ An email like that, you know straight away it's a scam because 5billlion dollars is not pocket change." “I have dealt with agreements where the government of Uganda is borrowing like $ 150 million, but if you see the amount of paperwork that is in there…it is serious staff. Now here comes this guy offering $5 billion, but they have three pages!” Read: New Bank of Uganda Governor impersonated Email Scams: A Global Threat to Government Officials Atingi-Ego’s experience is far from unique. Government agencies and high-ranking officials worldwide are prime targets for email scammers. According to a 2023 report by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) in the U.S., phishing attacks against government entities increased by 35% in the past two years. Similarly, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) says African government officials are frequently targeted by fraudulent investment schemes and fake contract offers (UNODC, 2022). Scammers often impersonate legitimate organisations or wealthy investors, hoping to exploit trust or urgency. In some cases, they use sophisticated tactics, such as spoofed email addresses or fake documentation, to appear credible.