CBN sets January 2027 deadline for payment data localisation

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has issued a firm compliance mandate fixing January 1, 2027 as the definitive cut-off date for all financial institutions to localize payment transaction processing, records, and archival hosting within Nigeria.

In line with circular directives on national payment system security, all commercial banks, merchant banks, microfinance institutions, switches, mobile payment operators, and fintech aggregators are mandated to migrate customer payment data from foreign servers to certified local data centres.

Addressing executives at the 7th CIO and C-Suite Conference in Lagos, regulatory heads affirmed that data localisation is essential to shielding the national payment grid from external cyber vulnerabilities, extraterritorial legal embargos, and sudden international network disruptions.

"The deadline is backed by extensive regulatory research in tandem with the National Sovereign Cloud Initiative (NSCI)," the apex bank affirmed. Regulators noted that while compliance assistance will be provided through structured milestones, institutions must submit verified audit reports showing progressive migration.

The directive is expected to catalyze multi-million-dollar capital investments into Nigeria's domestic tier-certified data centre industry, boosting local technology employment and domestic cloud capabilities.