Ant Group Releases 2021 Annual Report on Consumer Rights Protection
On Tuesday, Ant Group released its 2021 Annual Report on Consumer Rights Protection. The report indicates that, in 2021, Ant Group launched more than 30 measures in six different aspects to effectively protect consumers’ rights and interests.
The report included an analysis of the company’s platform responsibilities, improving product experience, standardizing platform marketing, paying attention to people with special needs, strengthening privacy protection, and standardizing platform order.
Ant Group also launched a special action group called “Ant 315”, which is involves the company’s departments for Consumer Protection, Security, Privacy, Commercial Marketing, Platform Governance, and other departments. This action aims to promote the introduction and implementation of measures for consumer rights protection.
At the beginning of 2021, Ant Group contributed to the establishment of China’s first province-level fintech ethics committee, namely, the Fintech Ethics Committee of Zhejiang, and took the lead in publishing its own self-discipline standards for digital financial platforms.
Shortly thereafter, Huabei and Jiebei released management tools for reasonable loans. Throughout the last year, Huabei sent more than 160 million reminders to consumers to watch their spending habits. The reminders seem to have had an effect since consumers who are using Huabei’s tools have seen their bills drop by more than 5%. Jiebei, meanwhile, supports its users to reduce their spending while the average loan balance of users using this service decreased by 11.3%.
In addition, Ant Group is working to prevent fraud by way of technology, having issued risk warnings to about 500,000 people every day. Together with the China Foundation for the Development of Financial Education, Ant Group has carried out anti-fraud and other basic financial knowledge education services and popularized public welfare actions in 100 counties and towns across China.
In terms of product experience that consumers care about, “Ant 315” continuously regulates marketing activities and pop-ups on Alipay. Since the launch of the service, about 100 illegal marketing activities have been punished while the number of marketing pop-up windows has been reduced by more than 70% every day. Finally, more than 70 products that users are dissatisfied with have been removed from the App.
Ant Group is also putting the protection of personal information at the core of its consumer protection efforts. In 2021, “Ant 315” optimized Alipay’s product privacy protection function, including launching a brief version of its privacy policy, optimizing personalized recommendations and closing the entrance of personalized advertisement.
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In creating more opportunities for groups with special needs, Alipay has launched an “Elder Mode” that features larger text and simpler characters. In addition, its “Blue Vest” volunteer action has spread to over 60 cities and served more than 200,000 elderly people.
