THE National Privacy Commission (NPC) has ordered the shutdown of four online lending apps (OLAs)—JuanHand, Pesopop, CashJeep and Lemon Loan—due to privacy violations.
In a statement on Wednesday, the NPC said it has launched an investigation into the said OLAs amid complaints of unauthorized use of personal data, resulting in harassment and shaming of borrowers.
The ban imposed on the lending apps shall remain in effect until lifted by the NPC.
The privacy watchdog said the apps gained access to the borrowers’ personal information through their mobile devices, including contacts and social media data. The NPC described this as “excessive,” as the OLA operators may “weaponize” the information to “harass and shame delinquent borrowers before persons in their mobile devices’ contact list to collect debts.”
“These online lending apps raised many red flags and the companies operating these apps demonstrate problematic data actions that expose borrowers to serious privacy risks and harms,” Privacy Commissioner Raymund E. Liboro said.
The findings by the Complaints and Investigation Division of the NPC revealed that the OLAs violated the principles of transparency, legitimate purpose and proportionality in the Data Privacy Act of 2012 and the NPC issuance on the Processing of Personal Data for Loan-Related Transactions.
“Companies operating these apps were provided the opportunity to reply to NPC’s findings, but two of the apps did not file position papers, while the other two failed to convince the Commission why it should not impose the ban,” the privacy watchdog said.
The NPC is also looking into possible criminal liabilities of the OLA operators’ directors, officers and agents.
The privacy agency instructed in four separate orders the Wefund Lending Corp. (JuanHand), Joywin Lending Investor Inc. (Lemon Loan), Cash8 Lending Corp. (CashJeep) and Populus Lending Corp. (Pesopop) to stop processing of borrowers’ personal data.
The NPC informed the National Telecommunications Commission and the Goggle Llc. to take down the erring OLAs.
Currently, the privacy watchdog said it is studying and investigating over 200 OLAs available for downloads.
NPC has been cracking down on OLAs, issuing a ban against 26 lending apps in 2019 for failing to respond to allegations lodged against them, including use of personal data to shame delinquent borrowers.
These are no longer publicly available for download, installation or use, NPC said.
Citing Google statistics, NPC noted that JuanHand has downloads of over a million; Lemon Loan and Pesopop, over half-a-million; and, CashJeep, more than a hundred thousand.