Woman gets harassing text after condom purchases

A woman is accusing Alibaba of leaking her private information after she received a harassing text message shortly after purchasing condoms online.

The Hangzhou woman said the message came shortly after she had bought two boxes of condoms on the company’s Tmall platform on Saturday.

“Miss, your condoms have been shipped,” read the message connected to her order, followed by “That’s a lot of condoms you got there. Are you a prostitute or something?”

She contacted Tmall’s customer service about the issue, who at first pointed the finger at a courier.

However, the woman said there was nothing printed on the package that would indicate its contents.

An Alibaba customer service representative told her the platform would contact Cainiao, the company’s logistics arm, to confirm the case.

Later, a local radio program in Hangzhou, Sound of Xihu, picked up the news and called the phone number that sent the harassing message.

A man answered, who denied sending the message.

When contacted by the station, an Alibaba representative deflected any blame, and said the woman may be at fault.

Cao Jie, with Alibaba’s department of customer relations, told the station that customer privacy is of top importance to the company, he also said the woman may have “unconsciously” leaked her own information.