50% Of Consumers Suffered Data Breach, Swamped with Unwanted Offers: Survey

More than 50 per cent of Indian consumers suffered a personal data breach that leaked their contact details to the public. As a result, they were inundated with unwanted offers like loans, insurance, etc., said a survey.

A survey by LocalCircles, a Delhi-based consumer research company, found that 34 per cent of people with bank accounts were approached with offers to open similar bank accounts.

Some 41,000 people in over 319 districts across the country participated in the survey. Of the total, about 64 per cent were men. Also, around 45 per cent were from Tier 1 cities, 33 per cent from Tier 2 cities, 22 per cent from Tier 3 and 4 cities, and rural districts.

Union Minister of State for Finance Bhagwat Karad told parliament in August 2022 that Indian banks reported 248 data breaches between June 2018 and March 2022, resulting in the theft of business and personal information of customers, mostly card details.

The report said loan agencies, insurance companies, and banks had compromised consumer data, possibly due to their weak data protection systems, “both internally and externally.”

Here’s What Indian Consumers Experienced

Over Half Of Consumers Saw Alternate Loan Offers: Fifty-nine per cent of consumers who had an existing loan with a lender were approached with alternate offers in the last five years.

Thirty-three per cent of consumers said they received alternate loan offers by email, phone calls, SMSes, and WhatsApp several times. However, 26 per cent said they received such messages only about once or twice.

The respondents said the alternative loan offers vary. For example, home loan terms range from a couple of months to 10 years.

“This indicates a massive data breach as the sender has access to an individual’s personal loan data, which is being used to send unsolicited loan offers,” the survey noted.

Forty Per Cent Of Consumers Contacted For Alternative Insurance Offers: Forty per cent of consumers said they received alternative insurance offers via emails, phone calls, SMSes, and WhatsApp in the last five years. Out of these, 30 per cent said the insurance companies approached them by multiple times.

“What this means is that, on an aggregate basis, 4 in 10 citizens who hold an insurance policy received detailed alternate offers to their policy, indicating that someone has access to not just their PAN (Permanent Account Number) card and Aadhaar card but also how much insurance they carry, their premium and when does their policy expire. Clearly, this data is being used to send unsolicited insurance policy offers to them,” noted LocalCircles.

Twenty-Three Per Cent Of People Repeatedly Approached With Alternate Banking Offers:

About 34 per cent said they received unsolicited banking offers and 23 per cent people said they were approached several times.

It again indicates that someone has access to people’s banking details which are used to solicit potential customers with similar or better terms for account opening at another bank, the survey observed.