In the credit card and online loan market in recent years, it has been common for debtors to fail to repay their debts on time due to various reasons. However, in this process, many debtors have unfortunately encountered pressure from various unidentified collection agencies, some of which call themselves "collection" unidentified persons, and use malicious harassment, intimidation and other means, which have brought great distress to debtors and their relatives and friends.
These unidentified collectors often use illegal tools such as virtual dialing software and number change software to deliberately hide their identity information in order to evade legal sanctions. They frequently contacted the debtor through telephone, text messages, social media and other channels, and even obtained the debtor's personal information, such as home address, contact information of relatives, etc., through illegal means, and then harassed and intimidated the debtor and his relatives and friends.
These malicious collection behaviors include, but are not limited to: phone bombing, insults, intimidation, and even fabrication of false information to defraud. These acts not only seriously infringe on the personal dignity and privacy of the debtors, but also bring great distress to their daily lives. What's more, some collectors even point the finger at the debtor's relatives and friends, and force the debtor to repay the debt by harassing them, which undoubtedly exacerbates the debtor's psychological burden and social pressure.
The actions of these unidentified collectors have actually constituted a criminal offense. According to the relevant laws and regulations of the mainland, malicious harassment, intimidation, and invasion of personal privacy are illegal and should be punished by law. However, because these collectors deliberately hide their identity information, debtors and their relatives and friends face great difficulties when defending their rights. They are often unable to determine the true identity of these collectors and effectively file complaints and reports to the relevant authorities.
Recently, Xiao Zhao in Henan Province reported to us that she frequently received calls from people claiming to be a post-loan risk control staff of a certain online loan platform, in which the other party claimed that a friend of Xiao Zhao had a loan of 6,000 yuan on the platform that was seriously overdue, and asked Xiao Zhao to urge the friend to repay the loan as soon as possible. This series of unknown calls has brought a lot of trouble to Xiao Zhao's normal life.
According to Xiao Zhao, the caller numbers on these calls were different each time, and the other party always emphasized the seriousness of the loan in a serious tone during the call. They claimed that a former colleague of Xiao Zhao had a 6,000 yuan loan on their platform that was seriously overdue, and asked Xiao Zhao to urge the former colleague to repay the loan as soon as possible. To make matters worse, these collectors even threaten to have a serious impact on the borrower's credit history if they don't make timely repayments.
However, what puzzled Xiao Zhao was that the former colleague was an employee who worked at Xiao Zhao's company a long time ago, and the two had not been in contact since he resigned. According to common sense, Xiao Zhao and this former colleague have not had any contact for more than a year. This can't help but make Xiao Zhao start to wonder, how did these so-called "collections" obtain her personal privacy information?
Faced with this series of questions, Xiao Zhao couldn't help but have deep worries about the security protection of personal information. She realized that in this information age, personal privacy information may be inadvertently leaked out and become a tool for criminals to use. These collection calls not only violated her personal privacy, but also caused her mental stress and distress.
In order to figure out the ins and outs of the matter, Xiao Zhao first searched the Internet for the name and related information of this online loan platform. She found that on the relevant industrial and commercial information website, the platform's business license had been revoked in May 2022. The main reason for the revocation is that in 2020 and 2021, the annual report was not published in accordance with the time limit stipulated in Article 8 of the Interim Regulations on the Disclosure of Enterprise Information, and there were also serious problems such as tax violations, being listed as a person subject to enforcement many times, and restricting high consumption.
Faced with such an online lending platform with serious problems, Xiao Zhao couldn't help but feel shocked and angry. She didn't understand why such a company, whose license had been revoked and had many violations of laws and regulations, could continue to collect money by maliciously harassing debtors and their relatives and friends. What makes Xiao Zhao even more puzzled is that he has nothing to do with these so-called "debts", but he was innocently involved.
What made Xiao Zhao even more puzzled was that she had nothing to do with this debt, but only knew the collection object, so how did her personal privacy information be illegally obtained? This reminded her of the saying circulating on the Internet that "one person borrows, and a hundred people suffer".
In order to solve this mystery, Xiao Zhao began to investigate deeply. First of all, Xiao Zhao contacted several friends in the financial industry to seek professional explanations and help. These friends told her that many online lending platforms ask for too many permissions when debtors download and install their clients. These permissions include, but are not limited to, sensitive information such as mobile phone contacts, call logs, SMS, MMS, videos, and photo albums, and even mobile phone dialing and SMS sending permissions. This means that even if the debtor does not borrow money on these platforms, their mobile phone privacy has been illegally obtained.
Xiao Zhao couldn't help but gasp after hearing this. She realized that this was not just her problem, but a dilemma that many people could face. She decided to continue her investigation to find out how these online lending platforms illegally obtained user privacy.
In further investigation, Xiao Zhao found that after the debtor installed the client, these online lending platforms would also require the debtor to fill in the operator's verification code through qualification assessment and credit granting, loan application and other links. This behavior is actually by collecting the operator's verification code to illegally obtain the call records of the applicant user within half a year. In this way, when the debtor fails to repay the loan on time, their relatives and friends, as well as the contacts in the address book and call history, will receive these so-called "collection" calls.
What shocked Xiao Zhao even more was that these online lending platforms would also illegally obtain the mobile phone albums of borrowers from time to time. They use these photos to make malicious threats to force users to repay their loans as soon as possible.
However, behind the boom in the online lending industry, there are some hidden dangers that no one knows. Especially in the debt collection process, some online lending platforms will provide a detailed directory of debtor information when transferring debts to third-party collection agencies, which cannot help but raise serious concerns about information security and privacy protection.
The content of this information catalogue is staggeringly detailed. It not only contains basic information such as the debtor's name, ID number, mobile phone number, and home address, but also involves highly sensitive personal data such as mobile phone address book, call logs, and mobile phone photo albums. What's more, the directory may also contain the contact information of the debtor's relatives and friends, which undoubtedly completely exposes the debtor's privacy to the collection agency.
However, we can't help but ask, how can these collectors easily access this information, and under normal circumstances, this sensitive information should be strictly protected and can only be obtained and used by the relevant authorities with the express authorization of the debtor. But in the online lending industry, it's hard to believe that these collection agencies can access and use this information so compliantly.
In fact, in most cases, the acquisition of this sensitive information is likely to involve illegal means. Some online lending platforms or collection agencies may have obtained the debtor's personal information without authorization through technical means or illegal channels. This behavior not only violates laws and regulations, but also seriously violates the privacy of the debtor.
Once this sensitive information is leaked or used by criminals, it will bring great risks to the debtor. Scam phone calls, harassing messages, and even threats to your personal safety can ensue. At the same time, the leakage of this information will also put the debtor's relatives and friends into unnecessary trouble.
Relevant industry insiders said that with the rapid development of Internet technology, communication tools are becoming more and more diversified, among which Internet dial-up software and number change software have attracted much attention because of their special functions. These two types of software can not only modify and simulate the number of the caller ID, but also automatically generate a false number, providing a convenient "invisible coat" for telecom fraudsters, making it difficult for the victim to distinguish the authenticity of the phone, and then fall into the trap of fraud, and fraudsters can use these software to modify the phone number that originally belonged to them to the official number of the bank, public security and other state organs or e-commerce platforms, so that the victim mistakenly believes that the caller is a credible institution or individual. In addition, some virtual dialer software can also automatically generate fake numbers, further enhancing the "camouflage" effect, making it more difficult for victims to distinguish between genuine and fake.
In particular, in some cases of telecommunications fraud, Internet dial-up software and number change software are widely used. Fraudsters can use these software to easily disguise their phone numbers as official numbers, and then make calls or send text messages to victims, tricking victims into divulging personal information or transferring money on fictitious charges, account irregularities, product refunds, etc. As these software can generate fake caller ID numbers, victims often find it difficult to distinguish the authenticity of phone calls and can be easily deceived.
In addition, the use of these software causes great distress and harm to the victims. First, since victims have difficulty distinguishing the authenticity of a phone call, they tend to answer the call or check the text message without suspicion and follow the instructions of the other party. This may lead to them leaking sensitive personal information, such as ID numbers, bank card numbers, passwords, etc., which poses a serious threat to the security of personal property. Secondly, even if the victim discovers the fraud in time, it is often difficult for the victim to track and report the fraud because the fraudster uses a fake number, resulting in the fraud not being cracked down in time.