23 ms·

Lenders are turning to coercive loan apps that shut down smartphones

121 points by akshaybhalotia 6y ago

Animats 6y ago
Your phone, car, door, power, and credit card can all now be turned off remotely. This has substantial hacking potential.
- ehnto 6y ago
  A common retort would be "not my home/car" but societies march onwards to the majority of people renting everything, including cars. So maybe not your house or your car, but most people's, which is a dangerous situation for many to be in. Imagine a slumlord raising rents on a whole building and the computer automatically locking out anyone who doesn't pay, or failing a payment on your car rental when you're away from home and it remotely locking in the middle of nowhere. These systems will be automated, taking any last shimmer of empathy away and abstracting the owners from the renters via a faceless software layer. If we are not careful we will end up with a software enabled split society of owners vs renters, where neither interacts with the other and the system is void of any humility or empathy. That isn't something "the market" can protect against in my opinion, the market will optimize toward monetary efficiency and renters hold no power to influence it. You can't just "find another house" when all properties are owned by the same class enacting the same will.
  - nicbou 6y ago
    This reminds me of Grapes of Wrath. The banks are these distant things that aren't a single person you can reason or fight with. Their agents absolve themselves of any responsibility, and just fulfil the will of The Bank. It's pictured like a monster that everyone feeds but no one controls. It really stuck with me and resurfaces often. https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/g/the-grapes-of-wrath/summary-and-analysis/chapter-5 https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/g/the-grapes-of-wrath...
    - ehnto 6y ago
      Reminds me of a past encounter at the bank. It felt like the agent had no agency over the "system". They didn't know what the outcome of the application would be, they barely had control over the interface and before I know it, by simply asking a question of the agent my credit rating had been demerited. As if I had angered the system for daring to ask. The agent was very apologetic but incapable of helping, as if apologizing for a beligerent master.
      - nicbou 6y ago
        I also get that a lot. When there's an invoicing issue with a partner, they won't fix it if their system won't allow them, and I'm expected to eat the cost for unpaid VAT. I have to not-so-subtly remind them that their inflexible software is not my problem, and that I won't bear the cost of its shortfalls.
    - throwaway81523 6y ago
      > This reminds me of Grapes of Wrath. It reminds me of The Diamond Age ;-). "What's the, uh, strategy for making sure people actually, you know, show up when they're supposed to show up?" Bud said. At this point the banker lost interest in the proceedings, straightened up, strolled around his desk, and sat down, staring out the window across the water toward Pudong and Shanghai. "That detail is not covered in the brochure," he said, "as most of our prospective customers do not share your diligent attention to detail insofar as that aspect of the arrangement is concerned." He exhaled through his nose, like a man eager not to smell something, and adjusted his goatee one time. "The enforcement regime consists of three phases. We have pleasant names for them, of course, but you might think of them, respectively, as: one, a polite reminder; two, well in excess of your pain threshold; three, spectacularly fatal."
  - fy20 6y ago
    > remotely locking in the middle of nowhere It doesn't even need to do that to cause problems. Most likely someone will decide that it should phone home to check the user is allowed access everytime you start the vehicle, and if it can't, well no driving for you today. https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/306338-phone-app-rental-car-stranded-california-boondocks https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/306338-phone-app-rental-...
  - masklinn 6y ago
    > A common retort would be "not my home/car" but societies march onwards to the majority of people renting everything, including cars. Renting is not even a factor. Tesla can and will locate, unlock, and back out of parking (possibly out of your property) your car remotely for the convenience of the repo man they send if you’re behind on payments. If they achieve FSD the car will probably just drive away as soon as it’s able to.
andraz 6y ago
Reminds one of the opening scene fron The 5th element or the opening of Ubiq from Phillip K. Dick.
- bryanrasmussen 6y ago
  The door refused to open. It said, "Five cents, please." "what are you talking about, I don't owe you anything!" The door sighed deeply "Yes, but you acquired me from Mr. Joe Chip, who had run up quite a big outstanding bill with every door in the city. As part of a door led crackdown on financial crime Mr. Chip's comings and goings were relegated to a pay as you come and go basis, and you, as part of your purchase of this door from Mr. Chip (or perhaps Mr. Chips estate I don't have all the paperwork) will have to pay as you come and go as well. It's all in the contract" "Oh yeah, well I got that contract right here!" Johnny was nothing if not organized, he pulled the eink contract out from a nearby cupboard. At first it was difficult to find the relevant section, as the parts about regarding assumption of previous owner's debts were by default toggled shut and whoever had implemented the contract had decided to make the toggling element a very small dot that looked like it could be a speck of dust attached to the electronic paper. But finally after poking at the dot for some minutes he managed to toggle it, displaying the legalese hidden within, sure enough; payment to his door for opening and shutting constituted a mandatory fee. "You discover I'm right," the door said. It sounded smug.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- walrus01 6y ago
  Hiro Protagonist and Vitaly Chernobyl, roommates, are chilling out in their home, a spacious 20-by-30 in a U-Stor-It in Inglewood, California. The room has a concrete slab floor, corrugated steel walls separating it from the neighboring units, and-this is a mark of distinction and luxury -- a roll-up steel door that faces northwest, giving them a few red rays at times like this, when the sun is setting over LAX. From time to time, a 777 or a Sukhoi/Kawasaki Hypersonic Transport will taxi in front of the sun and block the sunset with its rudder, or just mangle the red light with its jet exhaust, braiding the parallel rays into a dappled pattern on the wall.But there are worse places to live. There are much worse places right here in this U-Stor-It. Only the big units like this one have their own doors. Most ofthem are accessed via a communal loading dock that leads to a maze of wide corrugated-steel hallways and freight elevators. These are slum housing, 5-by-lOs and 10-by-lOs where Yanoama tribespersons cook beans and parboil fistfuls of coca leaves over heaps of burning lottery tickets. It is whispered that in the old days, when the U-Stor-It was actually used for its intended purpose (namely, providing cheap extra storage space to Californians with too many material goods), certain entrepreneurs came to the front office, rented out 1O-by-lOs using fake IDs, filled them up with steel drums full of toxic chemical waste, and then abandoned them, leaving the problem for the U-Stor-It Corporation to handle. According to these rumors, U-Stor-It just padlocked those units and wrote them off. Now, the immigrants claim,certain units remain haunted by this chemical specter. It is a story they tell their children, to keep them from trying to break into padlocked units.
anigbrowl 6y ago
Foucault's nightmare, realized.
renewiltord 6y ago
This is a great tool, honestly. The problem appears to be that the original owner passed on a restricted device to someone else while pretending it wasn't a restricted device. This is like if you sold a car with an ignition interlock device and somehow suckered the new owner. The law will eat you alive (as it should) rather than the ignition interlock manufacturer. However, in India, the law is completely absent at best and an active tool of your enemies at its worst.
- dataflow 6y ago
  It might have been a great tool to some extent but it's gone too far IMO. It's one thing to block non-safety-critical features of a device or make them annoying to use... it's something else to break functionality that people's lives might depend on. Block their ability to watch videos and install new apps and other stuff, OK, but to not even let them make a phone call? Should someone die because they didn't pay back $40 on your phone?
  - renewiltord 6y ago
    It's India. If you were going to die unless you make a call, you're going to die anyway because the other end is unlikely to answer fast enough. In this case, this guy was going to be unable to do his job until he called from a borrowed phone (people do this all the time, did it myself when I had to make a call there once and my phone was borked).
    - dataflow 6y ago
      "It was going to happen anyway" is such an easy way to justify terrible things...
      - renewiltord 6y ago
        Describing things as 'terrible' is such an easy way to justify not making cost-benefit analyses...
walrus01 6y ago
This is basically the cellphone version of a GPS-enabled, LTE-connected ignition system connected tracking device in a car purchased from an American "buy here, pay here" used car lot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U2eDJnwz_s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U2eDJnwz_s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buy_here,_pay_here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buy_here,_pay_here
hellbannedguy 6y ago
This should be illegal. Now I’m in a bad mood. Even if you have a judgment against you, you have rights. Oh yea, never liked the ignition lock either, or the boot. Make companies go through the court system if they have a problem with you.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- vbezhenar 6y ago
  It means that those companies just won't offer those phones for those people, end of story. Court system is too expensive, so its cost will be inside smartphone cost, so phones will not be affordable.
  - pydry 6y ago
    This would be vastly better. As it is customers are being teased into becoming reliant upon these phones before having the rug pulled from underneath them.
  - kergonath 6y ago
    It’s always the same thing, from child labour to the 80 hours work week or the Victorian workhouses. Yes, some things need to be banned, even though some people are desperate enough to rely on them. We should not reinforce this reliance, but instead provide a better alternative.
  - anoncake 6y ago
    So? Then people have to get phones they can afford.
- alex_smart 6y ago
  >the court system You're assuming the existence of a functioning court system where you can hope to get justice in a reasonable time frame. Given that this happened in India, that is a very bold assumption indeed.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
lifeisstillgood 6y ago
Your rights under law matter. I bang on about the idea of a MOOP - where our daily behaviour is monitored (by phones) and then can be used to improve our lives - from basic budgeting to helping us with communication styles and relationship advice (94% of husbands with marriages rated happy would stop now and not continue this argument. Press any key) But to do that demands medical levels of trust around the behaviour data - a d that needs both law and culture to be relentlessly clear about the trust levels. A leak of your argument rate with your kids should be seen as similar as a leak of your heart rate. And because all these things are linked, perhaps your credit rating should be seen as protected as your medical records. Anyway, this is a form of predatory lending - they cannot charge 1000% APR so charge it implicitly through the threat of losing a phone. Only the desperate will apply - which should be a very good reason for not giving the loan. (Then again, perhaps putting the app out there is a good signal that the lender should go to jail immmediately and be banned from financial industry. )
- robertlagrant 6y ago
  I think the loan rate is the only predatory thing here. They're putting this app on phones for a reason: people would just keep the phones without paying and it's impossible to retrieve them cost-efficiently. Most services stop working if you stop paying.
  - lifeisstillgood 6y ago
    But a predatory loan is a predatory loan. This is something about society's attitudes to protection of its citizens. The short answer is I prefer Liberal to Libertarian. The long answer is probably a book length.
    - rsj_hn 6y ago
      Loan rates are high because default rates are high. Take a look at auto lending. At the bottom you have like a 15% default rate (e.g. the worst subprime auto loans), for these you are going to get (say) a 20% interest rate. Now it's true that as rates go up, so do default rates, so the same people who would only default at a rate of 10% of the time if the lending rate was 8% are going to default at 15% of the time at a lending rate of 20%. That's the cold, hard, mathematical truth of how risk works -- those who are already safe bets are lent to at very low rates, but those in a precarious position are lent to at higher rates. No amount of hand-wringing or preaching from soapboxes is going to change the math. Now this can be a strong argument in favor of locking the poor out of credit markets. The argument goes: if they have a history of poor decision making or inability to maintain stable incomes, then we can protect them from making a poor decision about a loan by removing the possibility of getting a loan. I think this argument has a lot of force, but it also catches people who had bad credit due to sheer bad luck, and not poor decision making, and it makes life a bit harder for them. Another cold, hard truth - often to help a majority you have to hurt a minority. So we try another tack -- make those with good credit subsidize those with bad credit by forcing everyone to pay the same interest rate for a car. That is basically a law against credit analysis. Don't take things like payment history or income into account, every loan is made at 10%. Here the problem is that there are wealthy people who obviously pose little risk, and they will be able to borrow from other markets at a lower rate, and will exit the auto lending market, thus driving default rates up and the average interest rate up and again the net result is shutting down the entire auto-lending market rather than just keeping out those with bad credit. For this lending business to work, we need the best credit analysis possible, and attempts at making credit analysis less accurate create dead weight costs for everyone. Really this is an object lesson in an old economic dictum: don't mess with prices to stabilize incomes. If you want to help the poor, give them money. Don't try to regulate the prices the poor pay for things.
sleavey 6y ago
How is an app able to lock out the whole phone?
- sneak 6y ago
  Android phones.
  - StavrosK 6y ago
    I can't help but feel that the freedom to modify a phone is being mentioned as a negative.
    - sneak 6y ago
      Freedom to modify a phone is freedom to install software that lets some remote party disable it at will, in this case. They asked why it was possible (presumably asking because it isn't on iOS). I gave the accurate answer. Maybe if you think it's negative when I'm just stating the facts... it's actually negative. Sent from my (last) iPhone
      - StavrosK 6y ago
        Ooh this comment isn't helping your "I just stated the facts" case at all, is it.
sneak 6y ago
Reminder: if services like this are banned, the alternative remaining for the users is the same as if their phone were locked out: no phone. This is a way of extending credit to the high-risk. Without a way of reducing that risk, the credit won't be extended, and they will be worse off overall.
- eganist 6y ago
  Considering our history of misrepresenting risk (2008), I'm not sure I agree. The alternative prior to lockouts was slimmer margins or higher rates over longer periods, not an absence of credit, because other controls to recoup losses still existed; tools like lockouts serve to extend margins in an economic environment that hyper-prioritizes growth, but there will always be companies willing to extend credit.
- raverbashing 6y ago
  "But they wouldn't be able to afford it without this" is a textbook loan shark argument What it does is encourage them to go for a phone they can't afford. They could buy a cheaper phone, a used one, save money, etc, instead. But showing off is better I guess "Rim rental" repos are a booming business Edit: even the article agrees with me: "For now, the phone remains unlocked... he doesn’t mind the surveillance app as long as he can keep using his phone. Anyway, he has his eyes on a new 5G phone"
  - sneak 6y ago
    > What it does is make them go for a phone they can't afford. I think perhaps you have misattributed the responsibility here. The thing that "makes" someone take out a loan is the loan customer.
    - kennyadam 6y ago
      I think you mean capitalism.
  - superflit 6y ago
    "What it does is make them go for a phone they can't afford. You can buy a cheaper phone, a used one, save money, etc. " They Dont want a cheaper or used money or even save money. They want the "full social status" of a new brand phone. In my country and others having a brand new phone has higher social status than having money in the bank or a car sometimes.
tener 6y ago
Funny how Apple does similar thing when they think you owe them money. Sure, the phone is not in a total shutdown, but it is still crippled.
- freebuju 6y ago
  Source for this?
  - tener 6y ago
    There you go: https://dcurt.is/apple-card-can-disable-your-icloud-account https://dcurt.is/apple-card-can-disable-your-icloud-account HN discussion (17 days ago, 676 points, 302 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26310817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26310817 > It appears as though charges from Apple are special, and if your account is not 100% current, Apple will quickly take drastic action.
babayega2 6y ago
Sometimes I understand the rationale here of such apps. In Africa, many electrical utilities were failing to get consumers to pay on time electrical bills. That when we started implementing prepaid electricity meters: you estimate how much you will consume over the course of a month, you buy those kWh on a monthly basis. If they finish, the light goes out automatically. Electrical utilities are now less dependent on the goodwill of the consumer to pay bills. And here in many african countries, there is no simple way to track a person in order to make him repay a debt. Imagine peoples buying nice Samsung phones on a loan ( ex $560/phone is huge), how do you track them in order to get back your loan? Some hikes the price of calls and SMS, some do other things and finally other install a kill switch.
- walrus01 6y ago
  > That when we started implementing prepaid electricity meters: you estimate how much you will consume over the course of a month, you buy those kWh on a monthly basis These are a really old idea, there were coin operated electricity meters in the UK many years ago, in the 'everything is analog' era. https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+electricity+meter+coin&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=ALeKk03bpaRomkhovB_nwtOnorJVM-m_tw:1616141191838&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjbqpWN87vvAhVGK80KHacjCeEQ_AUoAXoECBYQAw&biw=1680&bih=953&dpr=2 https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+electricity+meter+coin&cl...
  - mattmanser 6y ago
    Were? They still exist, my mate has one. It got so full over lockdown he had to whack it to fit more pound coins in. Also, every now and then he moans about finding enough coins in this day and age. I think most of those sort of meters are now prepay cards in the uk, but the coin ones still exist.
    - mnahkies 6y ago
      Interesting I wasn't aware of coin operated traditional meters. Modern prepay meters in the UK can be topped up from your phone, or by entering a code if it fails to reach the meter. Your friend should see if they're are to get a smart meter installed, it should be free though not all suppliers install smart prepay meters AFAIK
neiman 6y ago
I AirBnBed an apartment a little more than a year ago, from a super nice, even slightly naive, owners. They instructed me to leave the apartment keys on the kitchen table when I departure, and leave the door unlocked. "You see", the explained, "it's a smart house. We can control everything from our phones! The door, lights, stove tv -- everything!". They were proud of how advanced they are (naive, as I said), while I was a bit freaked out they (or their kids) would play with stuff in the apartment during my stay.
mschuster91 6y ago
What keeps users from rooting the phone and deleting the "undeletable" app? It's installed at point of sale which means a factory reset should get rid of it. The only exception may be Samsung's Knoxguard in its newest iterations which requires the device to "phone home" to Samsung to unlock the bootloader.
- rini17 6y ago
  Usually connection to computer is required (which they might not even have), then finding the right software (if you don't know exactly what you want then it's 99% chance of malware) which is usually nontrivial to use and not in native language.
  - mschuster91 6y ago
    A perfect business model for "second hand" phone shops. I 'member during the old days of SIM locked phones a lot of these would offer unlocking under the table or provide you with solder-'em-yourself kits to do it yourself.
    - rini17 6y ago
      But unlocking a carrier-locked phones did not carry the risk of interfering with loan shark business.
- ajmadesc 6y ago
  I can imagine a world where hacking that phone which 'isn't your property' is illegal and not worth the risk. Capital runs the gov bruv
ab_testing 6y ago
I think the article clearly states the reason for this. There is a lack of formal credit scores or collateral making it difficult to assess loan-worthiness. Combine that with the fact that a disabled phone is no good for the owner or the lender, there is a substantial risk involved. And interest rates are nothing but a measure of risk premium.
freebuju 6y ago
This article reads like an episode of Black Mirror. What is wrong with India... This whole practice is despicable. And extremely predatory on the uneducated masses. Wouldn't be too far-fetched to see shady companies buying this data and re-targeting the same customers with other dubious financial products and loans. Lauded for being one of the most progressive countries in internet infrastructure & access, the government of India is sleeping on this if not outright colluding with these unscrupulous corporate scammers.
bongoman37 6y ago
People who think this should be banned don't realize that people who really want the phone can get into even worse arrangements to directly get cash to get the devices. In India it is not uncommon for poor people to get loans that are at about 10-20% per day interest rate. The incentives and dynamics behind this are quite interesting but suffice it to say that just banning this is unlikely to improve the conditions of the people who want these devices and may even make it worse.
gher-shyu3i 6y ago
When are we going to realize that any lending with expectation of profit (usury, interest, etc.) is predatory? There's a reason that these loans are prohibited in Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Yet, we keep thinking that there can exist the phenomenon of lending for profit, and keep a society going without its destructive behaviors. Time and time again it's shown to be parasitic and causes huge inequality.
- hawk_ 6y ago
  i am pretty sure loans weren't prohibited in Judaism, there's a reason for that whole history of money lending in europe predominantly done by the Jews. as for interest always bring predatory - like many things it's not so black and white. it's about moderation and regulation.
  - gher-shyu3i 6y ago
    It's prohibited for Jews to lend each other money with interest, ask any practicing Jew today. It seems to be a "loophole" that they're claiming that it only applies to lending money to each other, but not to gentiles. Interest cannot be done in moderation, we've seen those attempts countless times, yet it always gets out of control. It's not dissimilar with drinking. Some people may drink in moderation, but there will always be drunk driving and homicides and many other terrible things caused by drinking. No way around it with moderation.
    - hawk_ 6y ago
      interesting loophole. didn't know of it. but the answer can't be prohibition either can it? for drunk drivers, the consequences should be harsher no doubt. driving is a privilege not a right and should be recognized as such. but banning drinking alcohol altogether hasn't worked well in any society at large.
      - gher-shyu3i 6y ago
        > but banning drinking alcohol altogether hasn't worked well in any society at large. Nope :) I come from a society where when drinking was prohibited, people complied immediately. It was documented that the streets of Madinah were flooded with wine when the prohibition came down because everyone poured out their stashes. Of course, there will always be a small minority who will refuse to abide, either due to temptation or stubbornness. However, the prohibition under Islam has proven to work very very well. It's fallicious thinking to apply the failure of ban that was instituted in the US and generalize to other cultures. Islam has prohibited intoxicants 1400 years ago, but many people don't seem to bring it up. Edit: it seems people are downvoting our discussion.
aethertron 6y ago
In this story, wasn't Zameer was defrauded into paying for a phone that the seller had no right to sell? The seller didn't completely own it. So Zameer isn't really the owner now. Despite that, I think it would have been cool for Zameer to appropriate this phone, pay absolutely zero part of the loan, and hack it to remove the DRM. I hope lots of people in India learn how to do this and make this scam go extinct, and make a handsome profit.
throwaway210222 6y ago
For those who get offended by contracts between consenting adults, feast yourself on 'Airtime credit'. You can 'borrow' airtime from the operator and pay it back (at a premium of course) when you next recharge. https://www.airvantage.co.za/ https://www.airvantage.co.za/
dannymayers 6y ago
Well it's not all true. If you've had a bad app experience, don't extend it to all apps in the playmarket. In any case, if the application does not triple you, you can contact a reliable service and get a loan via NorthnLoans. I advise you to read before writing anything.
yew 6y ago
This article really deserves more attention. I hope you repost it at some point. The Datacultr app mentioned is a particularly barefaced example of efficiently extracting small amounts of money from many users through hardware control. There's also the idea of (effectively) embedding loans in smart hardware so they follow whoever's actually trying to use it. (Also already thing with cars.) Both techniques seem likely to have many other applications. Probably very unpleasant ones.
- isoprophlex 6y ago
  > Datacultr’s app has access to huge amounts of data: everything from texts, images, and user location. “We did some research and figured out, You know what? People really still want to buy a phone,” Juriasingani told Rest of World, explaining the genesis of his company. “They just can’t afford it.” If a person engages in these manipulative tactics, they'd be called psychopaths. But for a faceless corporate entity it's of course totally fine. Surveillance capitalism continues the war on it's users.
  - tehjoker 6y ago
    It's sometimes enlightening to read the words of business people in the cant of a mob boss.
    - goatinaboat 6y ago
      It's sometimes enlightening to read the words of business people in the cant of a mob boss. In some parts of the world they are the same thing
- akshaybhalotia 6y ago
  An interesting corollary I heard to "smart hardware that follows you" is "giving loans to generate more data that helps give more loans". That level of profiling sounds scary to me. Data is being used as collateral in this case, so this model literally treats data as "property", which IMO is not a good way of thinking about data.
- 6y ago

Your phone, car, door, power, and credit card can all now be turned off remotely. This has substantial hacking potential.

ehnto 6y ago
A common retort would be "not my home/car" but societies march onwards to the majority of people renting everything, including cars. So maybe not your house or your car, but most people's, which is a dangerous situation for many to be in. Imagine a slumlord raising rents on a whole building and the computer automatically locking out anyone who doesn't pay, or failing a payment on your car rental when you're away from home and it remotely locking in the middle of nowhere. These systems will be automated, taking any last shimmer of empathy away and abstracting the owners from the renters via a faceless software layer. If we are not careful we will end up with a software enabled split society of owners vs renters, where neither interacts with the other and the system is void of any humility or empathy. That isn't something "the market" can protect against in my opinion, the market will optimize toward monetary efficiency and renters hold no power to influence it. You can't just "find another house" when all properties are owned by the same class enacting the same will.
- nicbou 6y ago
  This reminds me of Grapes of Wrath. The banks are these distant things that aren't a single person you can reason or fight with. Their agents absolve themselves of any responsibility, and just fulfil the will of The Bank. It's pictured like a monster that everyone feeds but no one controls. It really stuck with me and resurfaces often. https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/g/the-grapes-of-wrath/summary-and-analysis/chapter-5 https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/g/the-grapes-of-wrath...
  - ehnto 6y ago
    Reminds me of a past encounter at the bank. It felt like the agent had no agency over the "system". They didn't know what the outcome of the application would be, they barely had control over the interface and before I know it, by simply asking a question of the agent my credit rating had been demerited. As if I had angered the system for daring to ask. The agent was very apologetic but incapable of helping, as if apologizing for a beligerent master.
    - nicbou 6y ago
      I also get that a lot. When there's an invoicing issue with a partner, they won't fix it if their system won't allow them, and I'm expected to eat the cost for unpaid VAT. I have to not-so-subtly remind them that their inflexible software is not my problem, and that I won't bear the cost of its shortfalls.
  - throwaway81523 6y ago
    > This reminds me of Grapes of Wrath. It reminds me of The Diamond Age ;-). "What's the, uh, strategy for making sure people actually, you know, show up when they're supposed to show up?" Bud said. At this point the banker lost interest in the proceedings, straightened up, strolled around his desk, and sat down, staring out the window across the water toward Pudong and Shanghai. "That detail is not covered in the brochure," he said, "as most of our prospective customers do not share your diligent attention to detail insofar as that aspect of the arrangement is concerned." He exhaled through his nose, like a man eager not to smell something, and adjusted his goatee one time. "The enforcement regime consists of three phases. We have pleasant names for them, of course, but you might think of them, respectively, as: one, a polite reminder; two, well in excess of your pain threshold; three, spectacularly fatal."
- fy20 6y ago
  > remotely locking in the middle of nowhere It doesn't even need to do that to cause problems. Most likely someone will decide that it should phone home to check the user is allowed access everytime you start the vehicle, and if it can't, well no driving for you today. https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/306338-phone-app-rental-car-stranded-california-boondocks https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/306338-phone-app-rental-...
- masklinn 6y ago
  > A common retort would be "not my home/car" but societies march onwards to the majority of people renting everything, including cars. Renting is not even a factor. Tesla can and will locate, unlock, and back out of parking (possibly out of your property) your car remotely for the convenience of the repo man they send if you’re behind on payments. If they achieve FSD the car will probably just drive away as soon as it’s able to.

andraz 6y ago

Reminds one of the opening scene fron The 5th element or the opening of Ubiq from Phillip K. Dick.

bryanrasmussen 6y ago
The door refused to open. It said, "Five cents, please." "what are you talking about, I don't owe you anything!" The door sighed deeply "Yes, but you acquired me from Mr. Joe Chip, who had run up quite a big outstanding bill with every door in the city. As part of a door led crackdown on financial crime Mr. Chip's comings and goings were relegated to a pay as you come and go basis, and you, as part of your purchase of this door from Mr. Chip (or perhaps Mr. Chips estate I don't have all the paperwork) will have to pay as you come and go as well. It's all in the contract" "Oh yeah, well I got that contract right here!" Johnny was nothing if not organized, he pulled the eink contract out from a nearby cupboard. At first it was difficult to find the relevant section, as the parts about regarding assumption of previous owner's debts were by default toggled shut and whoever had implemented the contract had decided to make the toggling element a very small dot that looked like it could be a speck of dust attached to the electronic paper. But finally after poking at the dot for some minutes he managed to toggle it, displaying the legalese hidden within, sure enough; payment to his door for opening and shutting constituted a mandatory fee. "You discover I'm right," the door said. It sounded smug.
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walrus01 6y ago
Hiro Protagonist and Vitaly Chernobyl, roommates, are chilling out in their home, a spacious 20-by-30 in a U-Stor-It in Inglewood, California. The room has a concrete slab floor, corrugated steel walls separating it from the neighboring units, and-this is a mark of distinction and luxury -- a roll-up steel door that faces northwest, giving them a few red rays at times like this, when the sun is setting over LAX. From time to time, a 777 or a Sukhoi/Kawasaki Hypersonic Transport will taxi in front of the sun and block the sunset with its rudder, or just mangle the red light with its jet exhaust, braiding the parallel rays into a dappled pattern on the wall.But there are worse places to live. There are much worse places right here in this U-Stor-It. Only the big units like this one have their own doors. Most ofthem are accessed via a communal loading dock that leads to a maze of wide corrugated-steel hallways and freight elevators. These are slum housing, 5-by-lOs and 10-by-lOs where Yanoama tribespersons cook beans and parboil fistfuls of coca leaves over heaps of burning lottery tickets. It is whispered that in the old days, when the U-Stor-It was actually used for its intended purpose (namely, providing cheap extra storage space to Californians with too many material goods), certain entrepreneurs came to the front office, rented out 1O-by-lOs using fake IDs, filled them up with steel drums full of toxic chemical waste, and then abandoned them, leaving the problem for the U-Stor-It Corporation to handle. According to these rumors, U-Stor-It just padlocked those units and wrote them off. Now, the immigrants claim,certain units remain haunted by this chemical specter. It is a story they tell their children, to keep them from trying to break into padlocked units.

anigbrowl 6y ago

Foucault's nightmare, realized.

renewiltord 6y ago

This is a great tool, honestly. The problem appears to be that the original owner passed on a restricted device to someone else while pretending it wasn't a restricted device. This is like if you sold a car with an ignition interlock device and somehow suckered the new owner. The law will eat you alive (as it should) rather than the ignition interlock manufacturer. However, in India, the law is completely absent at best and an active tool of your enemies at its worst.

dataflow 6y ago
It might have been a great tool to some extent but it's gone too far IMO. It's one thing to block non-safety-critical features of a device or make them annoying to use... it's something else to break functionality that people's lives might depend on. Block their ability to watch videos and install new apps and other stuff, OK, but to not even let them make a phone call? Should someone die because they didn't pay back $40 on your phone?
- renewiltord 6y ago
  It's India. If you were going to die unless you make a call, you're going to die anyway because the other end is unlikely to answer fast enough. In this case, this guy was going to be unable to do his job until he called from a borrowed phone (people do this all the time, did it myself when I had to make a call there once and my phone was borked).
  - dataflow 6y ago
    "It was going to happen anyway" is such an easy way to justify terrible things...
    - renewiltord 6y ago
      Describing things as 'terrible' is such an easy way to justify not making cost-benefit analyses...

walrus01 6y ago

This is basically the cellphone version of a GPS-enabled, LTE-connected ignition system connected tracking device in a car purchased from an American "buy here, pay here" used car lot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U2eDJnwz_s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4U2eDJnwz_s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buy_here,_pay_here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buy_here,_pay_here

hellbannedguy 6y ago

This should be illegal. Now I’m in a bad mood. Even if you have a judgment against you, you have rights. Oh yea, never liked the ignition lock either, or the boot. Make companies go through the court system if they have a problem with you.

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vbezhenar 6y ago
It means that those companies just won't offer those phones for those people, end of story. Court system is too expensive, so its cost will be inside smartphone cost, so phones will not be affordable.
- pydry 6y ago
  This would be vastly better. As it is customers are being teased into becoming reliant upon these phones before having the rug pulled from underneath them.
- kergonath 6y ago
  It’s always the same thing, from child labour to the 80 hours work week or the Victorian workhouses. Yes, some things need to be banned, even though some people are desperate enough to rely on them. We should not reinforce this reliance, but instead provide a better alternative.
- anoncake 6y ago
  So? Then people have to get phones they can afford.
alex_smart 6y ago
>the court system You're assuming the existence of a functioning court system where you can hope to get justice in a reasonable time frame. Given that this happened in India, that is a very bold assumption indeed.

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lifeisstillgood 6y ago

Your rights under law matter. I bang on about the idea of a MOOP - where our daily behaviour is monitored (by phones) and then can be used to improve our lives - from basic budgeting to helping us with communication styles and relationship advice (94% of husbands with marriages rated happy would stop now and not continue this argument. Press any key) But to do that demands medical levels of trust around the behaviour data - a d that needs both law and culture to be relentlessly clear about the trust levels. A leak of your argument rate with your kids should be seen as similar as a leak of your heart rate. And because all these things are linked, perhaps your credit rating should be seen as protected as your medical records. Anyway, this is a form of predatory lending - they cannot charge 1000% APR so charge it implicitly through the threat of losing a phone. Only the desperate will apply - which should be a very good reason for not giving the loan. (Then again, perhaps putting the app out there is a good signal that the lender should go to jail immmediately and be banned from financial industry. )

robertlagrant 6y ago
I think the loan rate is the only predatory thing here. They're putting this app on phones for a reason: people would just keep the phones without paying and it's impossible to retrieve them cost-efficiently. Most services stop working if you stop paying.
- lifeisstillgood 6y ago
  But a predatory loan is a predatory loan. This is something about society's attitudes to protection of its citizens. The short answer is I prefer Liberal to Libertarian. The long answer is probably a book length.
  - rsj_hn 6y ago
    Loan rates are high because default rates are high. Take a look at auto lending. At the bottom you have like a 15% default rate (e.g. the worst subprime auto loans), for these you are going to get (say) a 20% interest rate. Now it's true that as rates go up, so do default rates, so the same people who would only default at a rate of 10% of the time if the lending rate was 8% are going to default at 15% of the time at a lending rate of 20%. That's the cold, hard, mathematical truth of how risk works -- those who are already safe bets are lent to at very low rates, but those in a precarious position are lent to at higher rates. No amount of hand-wringing or preaching from soapboxes is going to change the math. Now this can be a strong argument in favor of locking the poor out of credit markets. The argument goes: if they have a history of poor decision making or inability to maintain stable incomes, then we can protect them from making a poor decision about a loan by removing the possibility of getting a loan. I think this argument has a lot of force, but it also catches people who had bad credit due to sheer bad luck, and not poor decision making, and it makes life a bit harder for them. Another cold, hard truth - often to help a majority you have to hurt a minority. So we try another tack -- make those with good credit subsidize those with bad credit by forcing everyone to pay the same interest rate for a car. That is basically a law against credit analysis. Don't take things like payment history or income into account, every loan is made at 10%. Here the problem is that there are wealthy people who obviously pose little risk, and they will be able to borrow from other markets at a lower rate, and will exit the auto lending market, thus driving default rates up and the average interest rate up and again the net result is shutting down the entire auto-lending market rather than just keeping out those with bad credit. For this lending business to work, we need the best credit analysis possible, and attempts at making credit analysis less accurate create dead weight costs for everyone. Really this is an object lesson in an old economic dictum: don't mess with prices to stabilize incomes. If you want to help the poor, give them money. Don't try to regulate the prices the poor pay for things.

sleavey 6y ago

How is an app able to lock out the whole phone?

sneak 6y ago
Android phones.
- StavrosK 6y ago
  I can't help but feel that the freedom to modify a phone is being mentioned as a negative.
  - sneak 6y ago
    Freedom to modify a phone is freedom to install software that lets some remote party disable it at will, in this case. They asked why it was possible (presumably asking because it isn't on iOS). I gave the accurate answer. Maybe if you think it's negative when I'm just stating the facts... it's actually negative. Sent from my (last) iPhone
    - StavrosK 6y ago
      Ooh this comment isn't helping your "I just stated the facts" case at all, is it.

sneak 6y ago

Reminder: if services like this are banned, the alternative remaining for the users is the same as if their phone were locked out: no phone. This is a way of extending credit to the high-risk. Without a way of reducing that risk, the credit won't be extended, and they will be worse off overall.

eganist 6y ago
Considering our history of misrepresenting risk (2008), I'm not sure I agree. The alternative prior to lockouts was slimmer margins or higher rates over longer periods, not an absence of credit, because other controls to recoup losses still existed; tools like lockouts serve to extend margins in an economic environment that hyper-prioritizes growth, but there will always be companies willing to extend credit.
raverbashing 6y ago
"But they wouldn't be able to afford it without this" is a textbook loan shark argument What it does is encourage them to go for a phone they can't afford. They could buy a cheaper phone, a used one, save money, etc, instead. But showing off is better I guess "Rim rental" repos are a booming business Edit: even the article agrees with me: "For now, the phone remains unlocked... he doesn’t mind the surveillance app as long as he can keep using his phone. Anyway, he has his eyes on a new 5G phone"
- sneak 6y ago
  > What it does is make them go for a phone they can't afford. I think perhaps you have misattributed the responsibility here. The thing that "makes" someone take out a loan is the loan customer.
  - kennyadam 6y ago
    I think you mean capitalism.
- superflit 6y ago
  "What it does is make them go for a phone they can't afford. You can buy a cheaper phone, a used one, save money, etc. " They Dont want a cheaper or used money or even save money. They want the "full social status" of a new brand phone. In my country and others having a brand new phone has higher social status than having money in the bank or a car sometimes.

tener 6y ago

Funny how Apple does similar thing when they think you owe them money. Sure, the phone is not in a total shutdown, but it is still crippled.

freebuju 6y ago
Source for this?
- tener 6y ago
  There you go: https://dcurt.is/apple-card-can-disable-your-icloud-account https://dcurt.is/apple-card-can-disable-your-icloud-account HN discussion (17 days ago, 676 points, 302 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26310817 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26310817 > It appears as though charges from Apple are special, and if your account is not 100% current, Apple will quickly take drastic action.

babayega2 6y ago

Sometimes I understand the rationale here of such apps. In Africa, many electrical utilities were failing to get consumers to pay on time electrical bills. That when we started implementing prepaid electricity meters: you estimate how much you will consume over the course of a month, you buy those kWh on a monthly basis. If they finish, the light goes out automatically. Electrical utilities are now less dependent on the goodwill of the consumer to pay bills. And here in many african countries, there is no simple way to track a person in order to make him repay a debt. Imagine peoples buying nice Samsung phones on a loan ( ex $560/phone is huge), how do you track them in order to get back your loan? Some hikes the price of calls and SMS, some do other things and finally other install a kill switch.

walrus01 6y ago
> That when we started implementing prepaid electricity meters: you estimate how much you will consume over the course of a month, you buy those kWh on a monthly basis These are a really old idea, there were coin operated electricity meters in the UK many years ago, in the 'everything is analog' era. https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+electricity+meter+coin&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=ALeKk03bpaRomkhovB_nwtOnorJVM-m_tw:1616141191838&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjbqpWN87vvAhVGK80KHacjCeEQ_AUoAXoECBYQAw&biw=1680&bih=953&dpr=2 https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+electricity+meter+coin&cl...
- mattmanser 6y ago
  Were? They still exist, my mate has one. It got so full over lockdown he had to whack it to fit more pound coins in. Also, every now and then he moans about finding enough coins in this day and age. I think most of those sort of meters are now prepay cards in the uk, but the coin ones still exist.
  - mnahkies 6y ago
    Interesting I wasn't aware of coin operated traditional meters. Modern prepay meters in the UK can be topped up from your phone, or by entering a code if it fails to reach the meter. Your friend should see if they're are to get a smart meter installed, it should be free though not all suppliers install smart prepay meters AFAIK

neiman 6y ago

I AirBnBed an apartment a little more than a year ago, from a super nice, even slightly naive, owners. They instructed me to leave the apartment keys on the kitchen table when I departure, and leave the door unlocked. "You see", the explained, "it's a smart house. We can control everything from our phones! The door, lights, stove tv -- everything!". They were proud of how advanced they are (naive, as I said), while I was a bit freaked out they (or their kids) would play with stuff in the apartment during my stay.

mschuster91 6y ago

What keeps users from rooting the phone and deleting the "undeletable" app? It's installed at point of sale which means a factory reset should get rid of it. The only exception may be Samsung's Knoxguard in its newest iterations which requires the device to "phone home" to Samsung to unlock the bootloader.

rini17 6y ago
Usually connection to computer is required (which they might not even have), then finding the right software (if you don't know exactly what you want then it's 99% chance of malware) which is usually nontrivial to use and not in native language.
- mschuster91 6y ago
  A perfect business model for "second hand" phone shops. I 'member during the old days of SIM locked phones a lot of these would offer unlocking under the table or provide you with solder-'em-yourself kits to do it yourself.
  - rini17 6y ago
    But unlocking a carrier-locked phones did not carry the risk of interfering with loan shark business.
ajmadesc 6y ago
I can imagine a world where hacking that phone which 'isn't your property' is illegal and not worth the risk. Capital runs the gov bruv

ab_testing 6y ago

I think the article clearly states the reason for this. There is a lack of formal credit scores or collateral making it difficult to assess loan-worthiness. Combine that with the fact that a disabled phone is no good for the owner or the lender, there is a substantial risk involved. And interest rates are nothing but a measure of risk premium.

freebuju 6y ago

This article reads like an episode of Black Mirror. What is wrong with India... This whole practice is despicable. And extremely predatory on the uneducated masses. Wouldn't be too far-fetched to see shady companies buying this data and re-targeting the same customers with other dubious financial products and loans. Lauded for being one of the most progressive countries in internet infrastructure & access, the government of India is sleeping on this if not outright colluding with these unscrupulous corporate scammers.

bongoman37 6y ago

People who think this should be banned don't realize that people who really want the phone can get into even worse arrangements to directly get cash to get the devices. In India it is not uncommon for poor people to get loans that are at about 10-20% per day interest rate. The incentives and dynamics behind this are quite interesting but suffice it to say that just banning this is unlikely to improve the conditions of the people who want these devices and may even make it worse.

gher-shyu3i 6y ago

When are we going to realize that any lending with expectation of profit (usury, interest, etc.) is predatory? There's a reason that these loans are prohibited in Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Yet, we keep thinking that there can exist the phenomenon of lending for profit, and keep a society going without its destructive behaviors. Time and time again it's shown to be parasitic and causes huge inequality.

hawk_ 6y ago
i am pretty sure loans weren't prohibited in Judaism, there's a reason for that whole history of money lending in europe predominantly done by the Jews. as for interest always bring predatory - like many things it's not so black and white. it's about moderation and regulation.
- gher-shyu3i 6y ago
  It's prohibited for Jews to lend each other money with interest, ask any practicing Jew today. It seems to be a "loophole" that they're claiming that it only applies to lending money to each other, but not to gentiles. Interest cannot be done in moderation, we've seen those attempts countless times, yet it always gets out of control. It's not dissimilar with drinking. Some people may drink in moderation, but there will always be drunk driving and homicides and many other terrible things caused by drinking. No way around it with moderation.
  - hawk_ 6y ago
    interesting loophole. didn't know of it. but the answer can't be prohibition either can it? for drunk drivers, the consequences should be harsher no doubt. driving is a privilege not a right and should be recognized as such. but banning drinking alcohol altogether hasn't worked well in any society at large.
    - gher-shyu3i 6y ago
      > but banning drinking alcohol altogether hasn't worked well in any society at large. Nope :) I come from a society where when drinking was prohibited, people complied immediately. It was documented that the streets of Madinah were flooded with wine when the prohibition came down because everyone poured out their stashes. Of course, there will always be a small minority who will refuse to abide, either due to temptation or stubbornness. However, the prohibition under Islam has proven to work very very well. It's fallicious thinking to apply the failure of ban that was instituted in the US and generalize to other cultures. Islam has prohibited intoxicants 1400 years ago, but many people don't seem to bring it up. Edit: it seems people are downvoting our discussion.

aethertron 6y ago

In this story, wasn't Zameer was defrauded into paying for a phone that the seller had no right to sell? The seller didn't completely own it. So Zameer isn't really the owner now. Despite that, I think it would have been cool for Zameer to appropriate this phone, pay absolutely zero part of the loan, and hack it to remove the DRM. I hope lots of people in India learn how to do this and make this scam go extinct, and make a handsome profit.

throwaway210222 6y ago

For those who get offended by contracts between consenting adults, feast yourself on 'Airtime credit'. You can 'borrow' airtime from the operator and pay it back (at a premium of course) when you next recharge. https://www.airvantage.co.za/ https://www.airvantage.co.za/

dannymayers 6y ago

Well it's not all true. If you've had a bad app experience, don't extend it to all apps in the playmarket. In any case, if the application does not triple you, you can contact a reliable service and get a loan via NorthnLoans. I advise you to read before writing anything.

yew 6y ago

This article really deserves more attention. I hope you repost it at some point. The Datacultr app mentioned is a particularly barefaced example of efficiently extracting small amounts of money from many users through hardware control. There's also the idea of (effectively) embedding loans in smart hardware so they follow whoever's actually trying to use it. (Also already thing with cars.) Both techniques seem likely to have many other applications. Probably very unpleasant ones.

isoprophlex 6y ago
> Datacultr’s app has access to huge amounts of data: everything from texts, images, and user location. “We did some research and figured out, You know what? People really still want to buy a phone,” Juriasingani told Rest of World, explaining the genesis of his company. “They just can’t afford it.” If a person engages in these manipulative tactics, they'd be called psychopaths. But for a faceless corporate entity it's of course totally fine. Surveillance capitalism continues the war on it's users.
- tehjoker 6y ago
  It's sometimes enlightening to read the words of business people in the cant of a mob boss.
  - goatinaboat 6y ago
    It's sometimes enlightening to read the words of business people in the cant of a mob boss. In some parts of the world they are the same thing
akshaybhalotia 6y ago
An interesting corollary I heard to "smart hardware that follows you" is "giving loans to generate more data that helps give more loans". That level of profiling sounds scary to me. Data is being used as collateral in this case, so this model literally treats data as "property", which IMO is not a good way of thinking about data.
6y ago