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The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has entered into a strategic partnership with the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) to address the increasing rates of data privacy abuse by money lending operators, particularly fintech.
This is according to a statement signed by Mrs Hadiza Umar, Head, Corporate Affairs and External Relations, at NITDA, and seen by Nairametrics.
According to NITDA, the impacted money loan companies have been exploiting their customers’ personal information, compromising their privacy, and sharing it with those who were not involved in the initial arrangement.
Read: Loan apps go gangster, send ‘shame’ messages to close contacts of loan defaulters
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What NITDA is saying
The statement signed by Mrs Hadiza Umar, reads, “These operators execute this by abusing their data, breaching their privacy and sharing it with others who are not part of the initial contract.
“The Agency has received over 40 petitions from members of the public on the personal data abuse of some lending companies. Our investigations led to the imposition of a Ten million naira (N10,000,000) fine and other administrative sanctions on Soko Lending Company
“As an agency focused on using its mandate to empower Nigerians and make them active players in the digital economy, NITDA is very concerned about the worrisome effect the nefarious activities of the money lending companies is having on families, friends, and the society at large.”
Read: NITDA, FCCPC to sanction money lending fintechs for abuse of customers’ data privacy
Umar said that NITDA is worried about the effect the nefarious activities of the money lending companies is having on families, friends, and the society at large, as some of the complainants had contemplated suicide, indicating that the government needed to do more to protect vulnerable Nigerians.
“The partnership with FCCPC will lead to a more robust and concerted regulatory approach which we believe would ensure that Nigerians get a necessary reprieve from the illegal use of their data for money lending operations. The partnership would entail joint investigations, enforcement and possible prosecution.
“We, therefore, use this medium to inform all money lending operators and other data controllers and processors that NITDA is set to enforce the privacy right of Nigerians in line with the Nigeria Data Protection Regulation (NDPR) 2019.”
Read: CBN gives banks approval to debit bank accounts of chronic loan defaulters starting August 1
Umar noted that NITDA’s investigation led to the imposition of a ten million naira (N10,000,000) fine and other administrative sanctions on Soko Lending Company.
She remarked that controllers and Processors who seek guidance on Compliance with the NDPR should contact NITDA licensed Data Protection Compliance Organizations (DPCO).
Read: CBN may publish names of agric fund defaulters, risk 5-year jail term for diversion
In case you missed it
Findings made by Nairametrics showed that a number of these loan app operators now send embarrassing short messages service (SMS) and WhatsApp messages to the close contacts of their loan defaulters with the intention of shaming the defaulters, tagging them with terms like ‘criminal,’ ‘fraudster,’ and ‘terrible debtor’ among others.
In some cases, the full names, phone numbers and pictures of the alleged loan defaulters are shared with their contacts like religious leaders, members of churches and mosques, close friends, bosses, colleagues and family members.
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Even with the fine Sokoloan I still doing it, dey did same thing to a contact of mine 2weeks ago for defaulting JSt one day.
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This is a very good development I would love those agencies to see through. Why will they be sending messages to people who were never part of the contract in the first place? In fact, the fine should be raised above that.
I advise the loan companies to look for other ways to recover their monies rather than disturbing people with information that do not concern them.
Pls, they need really need to do something about it. I nearly committed suicide when people started calling me that my name is everywhere because of #5000. They really messed me up and i still paid. Huh.
Way to go NITDA/FCCPC. It’s a conciliatory response as the agencies seek not to victimise these online lenders put to adopt appropriate regulatory processes for more orderly operations. Timely too !!
Exactly what was sent to my contacts. I almost lost it. If this agency means business, then they should out a stop to all this. It’s very debilitating. Imagine a senior colleague telling me today that he received the message and chose to insult the person who sent it and blocked her. What of others? No one knows who receives this messages and chooses to be quiet. It’s very disheartening. God help us
This is causing many to commit suicide. Mental disorder and frustration many have lost their jobs and relationship because of the embarrassing messages from this people.
The sokolendin group are still embarrassing defaulters. I don’t think the fine is the best option. They should be short down from the business.
They should check 9credit those ones even revealed my bvn to unknown people on my phone and said I was a criminal. Not just sokoloan, okash are stealing people’s money debiting people twice or more. Check okash what people are going through on Instagram. They kept mute and pretend their account doesn’t function. Once they know they’ve stolen your money they will block your number only when you’re owing they expect you to pick their call. L- credit is doing the same thing to customers now playstore has removed them so they use links. They can embarrass and message all your info. This is terrible. They will embarrass and still give you loan again worst part is it’s 15 days and worstly if your shown you will be given 100k it’s 70k the will give so when you’re paying , you pay 100k is the interest not stealing? Even banks can’t charge like that.
Anyway God will make things better for us not have to borrow from these criminals. Their are other loans like branch, carbon, fairmoney. These are the best because they give up to 30 days.
Thisssssss… I total agree to every thing here. Maybe God really deliver us from taking loans from this people. I can totally relate to everything you said.
The best among all is fairmoney
Fairmoney are truly living up to their name….they are totally fair in all their doings. One month tenure for loan repayment. Awesome!!!
Ha!!!! I suffered same from nine credit some weeks back. The shameless family of *** that’s how they started the message. See me an orphan getting calls and messages from friends, home and abroad. It was Enough to make me commit suicide. They are all guilty, robbing us blind and taking advantage of the hard times. What shocks me the most is that they are run by the Chinese o. Useless people making our people turn against us. It’s terrible. God help us o. Let play store remove all the thieves. I’m glad lcredit is out.
I am telling you, i am even baffled by the way the got some of there informations. The data bridge is so sophisticated to the extent they will tell you the so called defaulters mothers name and address. Only God knows how they got all those info. If loan companies could lay hands on such information, we are not safe atall.
Yeah they should be shut down from the business
Ncash, 9ja cash and there likes in that SOKO family, are still sending messages and destroying people’s image. I got such message and picture attached to it few days ago of someone I know, would never be involved in any ungodly act. But they have labeled him a wanted criminal because of late payment.
Please, Let NITDA work harder to see that these Organisations, practicing human image killing, destroying life’s, inflicting social and moral damage on people, are stopped and also find ways to give rehabilitation to people who have suffered damage as a result of the act of deformation of character.
Not only sokoloan is doing that all the loan app,off you need a loan please go to your bank.not all this unknown insulting people that don’t know how to do business.
These people are frustrating,especially Lcredit,they will send messages and even recorded calls to your contacts,disturbing people unecessary.So many people has lost their jobs and integrity because of this act,they need to be shut down.
Please I have sent many reports and evidence on the abuse of my human fundamental rights . I paid alot of the apps yet they are still called me fraudstars, I lost a lot of friends and business associates