KUWAIT: The Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) and Kuwait Banking Association (KBA) announced the launch of 'Diraya' (Be Aware) Campaign for the second year in a row. The campaign activities are geared to spread financial awareness to a wider segment of society and increase public awareness of the banking sector's role and how customers can use banks' diverse services advantageously.

In a press statement by the CBK statement, the bank's Governor Dr Mohammad Al-Hashel noted that the launch of 'Diraya' awareness campaign for the second year came because of the positive feedback on the first campaign, launched in early 2021, overseen by the CBK and managed by the KBA with the participation of all Kuwaiti banks. Such campaigns, he stressed, were a great means to educate customers of their rights and as dictated by the CBK through its instructions to the banking sector.

He pointed out that this campaign in its second round covers a diversity of topics, including increasing awareness to avoid scams, fraud and cybercrimes targeting customers in different ways, whether via e-mails, text messages or phone calls, as these means are used to obtain confidential banking information, such as account numbers, passwords, and OTP numbers. Also, the second campaign reiterated last year's themes in a new catching way besides highlighting other trending topics.

The Governor reaffirmed the CBK's continuous commitment to raising financial awareness given the fast-evolving banking and financial services and products, which benefited from the telecommunications and digitalization revolution, and expanded to meet the growing needs of customers. Undoubtedly, this poses challenges and risks that must be faced by involving customers in the process of protecting their data, maintaining confidentiality, and increasing their financial awareness.

It is noteworthy that the campaign utilizes various communication channels including, awareness videos, press releases and introductory materials, especially online channels, e.g., CBK, KBA and Kuwait banks' social media accounts, and banks' branches and other points of contact with the public to ensure a wide spread of the campaign's messages.

The campaign in its first year reached a wide segment of society, with a total number of views of around 100 million through the various social media platforms thanks to the collaboration between the various authorities, including the Ministry of Information, the Ministry of Interior, the Capital Markets Authority, units of the Kuwaiti banking sector, and other entities. - KUNA