Cell users vexed over private data leak
Print 
Cell phone users recently complained they have been harassed by uninvited calls from service providers, to whom they have never supplied any information and that their personal data could have been sold.
It turns out that a market selling personal information has existed for marketing purposes in the fields of banking, insurance, real estate and others, as Tuoi Tre finds out.
N.H.D., the subscriber of two MobiFone numbers 090896xxxx and 090818xxxx, suspects that MobiFone has been leaking his confidential details.
This person has been repeatedly pestered by an insurance company selling various loan services.
D. said he many times refused their offers and even lied that the phone numbers were not his but the callers insisted they got the right person and that they knew his full name.
“Why does this company have my phone numbers and my name that I only submitted to MobiFone?”, D. wrote in an angry letter to Tuoi Tre.
Like D., Ms. Uyen, the subscriber of 091885xxxx, said she often received unexpected calls from some banks trying to offer her loans.
She similarly does not know how they obtained her phone number.
Mr. T., of District 10, Ho Chi Minh City, the holder of 098827xxxx, was disturbed by many calls from an insurance company having a branch in District 8.
When he asked how the company knew his number, the caller said, “Our marketing department collects information of potential customers from different sources”.
“I am calling from my corporation. It is clever for us to know your number. Today’s business is like that.”
Ms. N., who previously worked for an insurance company, told Tuoi Tre such information could be bought from those who specialize in collecting customer database for sale or directly from companies that are maintaining such a database.
As mobile marketing booms, customer database has become a vital instrument to businesses, said Le Manh Hung, deputy director of the Digital Content Club and director of the ABC Communication JSC.
Most companies, especially online ones, request their customers to provide personal information, including phone numbers, which companies say will help them deliver their services to customers rapidly and effectively.
After building up a customer database, companies will not only use it for their own purposes but also sell it to those who are interested, Hung said.
Because building a strong customer database takes time, many large companies opt to buy it, he added.
Flat denials
Tuoi Tre has referred the problem to Viettel, MobiFone and Vinaphone, three leading mobile service providers in the country.
Ms. Thu Hong, media representative of Vinaphone affirm her company will never disclose any private information of its customers to anyone.
Similarly, MobiFone said: “MobiFone undertakes and confirms that all the personal information of its customers is kept absolutely confidential.”
Meanwhile, Viettel has yet to give a reply to Tuoi Tre.
It is very difficult to track down where customers’ private information is disclosed, Mr. Hung said.
He said his company’s customer database is not only saved in a common server but is also in the hands of network providers.
“Therefore, customers’ personal details are very vulnerable to a leak despite our effort to keep them confidential,” he said.
He admitted that many companies have already obtained his customers’ information.
Vo Do Thang, director of the Athena network security center, said the most common disclosure is through employees of that company.
Once disclosed, customer databases can be traded like a commodity, Thang added.
