After reviewing numerous complaints, Google India said it will remove any apps relating to personal lending that are found to be in violation of its terms of service.
“The apps that were found to violate our user safety policies were immediately removed from the Store, and we have asked the developers of the remaining identified apps to demonstrate that they comply with applicable local laws and regulations,” Google India said in a Thursday (Jan. 14) blog post.
The apps, which were not identified in the post, will be dropped “without further notice” if they fail to comply with the rules, according to the post. “In addition, we will continue to assist the law enforcement agencies in their investigation of this issue.”
Google India said it pored through hundreds of personal loan apps in India’s Google Play store, targeting “flags submitted by users and government agencies.”
The policy requires transparency by financial services apps that extend personal loans.
The developers have to disclose data about the repayment period, annual percentage rates and total cost of the loan.
“To help further ensure that users are making sound choices, we only allow personal loan apps with full repayment required in greater than or equal to 60 days from the date the loan is issued,” Google India said in the post.
Further, in order to better protect users’ privacy, developers can only ask for permissions that are critical to the app’s features or services. Data from permissions granted can’t be used for any purposes aside from what the users agreed to. Data can’t be used for any reasons that are undisclosed, unimplemented or disallowed. Separate permissions must be requested for any additional uses of the data.
Alleged violations of local laws are published in Google’s transparency report and include those discovered by government agencies. The interactive tool shows users in a particular region how local policy impacts access to information.
India said in October that it was exploring the possibility of launching its own app store that wouldn’t charge the 30 percent fees levied by Google and Apple.
As digital financial services continue to escalate in the country, the Reserve Bank of India released its first Digital Payments Index. The new semi-annual report tracks cashless transaction growth weighted across five parameters.
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