BIZLINKS...

Because of restriction on people movement, pyramiding scams are using e-mails to reach out to potential victims. Beware.

Selling online

Nowadays, the most fashionable scamming crooks are those that purportedly sell online goods and services; some are already doing this even under the umbrella of big legitimate online stores like Amazon, Alibaba, Shopee, Lazada, and Zalora.

While vendors of big online outlets are asked to sign contracts that vouch for their integrity, a few bad eggs still fall through the cracks. Getting a refund for a defective or poor-quality product may be a standard operating procedure, but chasing your payment may become too tedious.

The worst online marketplace, however, is through social networks, the most famous being Facebook. Unfortunately, Mark Zuckerberg and his team have not been able to extend any policing measures to those that misuse and abuse Facebook as a selling channel.

Still, Facebook is a savior for starting micro entrepreneurs and those self-employed who are trying to earn some decent money to get through the pandemic-induced quarantines. Online users will just have to be more cautious and discerning about trusting who they transact business with.

The coronavirus era has also spawned new channels for online transactions. Delivery services have expanded their portfolio, much the same way that Amazon did during its early years, to more products beyond food and beverages.

Small marts, wet market vendors, meat shops, drugstores, and even neighborhood hardware stores are being connected directly to households that opt to restrict their mobility and minimize exposure to the virus through such companies as Grab and Lalamove.

Tech integrity

So far, complaints have been confined to service quality, with incidents like late deliveries being the most common problem. As more people rely on expanded delivery services, new companies are cropping up to fill in the gap of existing ones. This is where government should come in to make sure that such newcomers operate on secure app platforms.

We’ve seen how Wirecard, which is similar to such payment platforms as Smart Money, GCash, or PayMaya, could be vulnerable to a lack of internal controls. To be feared more, though, would be big league hackers who could sabotage app systems.

If our big banks had experienced one or another form of destabilization in their online transaction platforms, what more can we expect of those smaller companies.

Need to be prudent

As the world is forced to move to more e-commerce because of the virus, keeping technology safe from hackers becomes even more important. On the government side, the Department of Trade and Industry is pushing for the creation of an e-commerce bureau that will oversee regulation of this new sector.

While we wait for government to come up with an effective response, it will be up to us individually to be prudent in discerning the possible pitfalls of being more dependent on online transactions. Let’s all take care, not just of our health, but also our wallets.

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Should you wish to share any insights, write me at Link Edge, 25th Floor, 139 Corporate Center, Valero Street, Salcedo Village, 1227 Makati City. Or e-mail me at reydgamboa@ yahoo.com. For a compilation of previous articles, visit www.BizlinksPhilippines.net.