One of the biggest sectors in the world is the banking sector. There might be a time when IT will be on a high and some other time when some industry that may be high. But there is a common backbone for any kind of industry to emerge. It is the financial sector. Any investment requires funding. Banking industry is banking on this weakness to emerge as the ultimate leader among all other sectors.
I work in one of the biggest IT companies in the world. I like to lead a private life and hence I don’t share my work or cell numbers with many individuals. But it flummoxes me that I get at least a dozen calls from various banks in India requesting me to go for a personal loan or worse, a credit card.
I had no clue how my private information got leaked to these banks and financial institutions. I started my investigation on the net to find the patterns of such intrusion into our private lives. I found some people talking about some people in Governmental agencies trading the information for hard cash. Each name and phone number goes for at least 2 cents. This information is gathered by middle men who sell the same to several banks in the same country. Nobody has a clue to put an end to this malpractice.
Here is one of my conversations with the bank representative who called me:
Bank Representative: Hello Sir! My name is Sarah (imaginary) and I am calling from XYZ bank. Would you like to go for a personal loan?
Me: No. I don’t need a personal loan
BR: Sir we are offering very less interest rate and you can get the loan by next week
Me: I told you that I don’t need a personal loan
BR: Sir you will also get movie tickets along with the loan sir
Me: Can you understand English
BR: Yes sir
Me: Never ever call me again.
BR: OK sir but please consider this personal loan sir
Me: (hang-up)
As you can read from my conversation with one such representatives, these people are extremely desperate to give loans and the worst part is this is just one such conversations I have in a day out of many more. Sometimes the same bank calls you multiple times a day.
In India there are no laws against calling people who are not interested. In the US, it is against the law for salesmen to call cell phones without permission. Also, the landlines could avail the feature of letting salesmen know that you are not interested in their calls.
I view these bank salesmen and others as spammers in lieu with phones compared to email accounts. Any unwanted call on the cell phone or landline is a spam call and there should be more stringent rules to stop these as calls are easier to trace than mails.
I hope there would be a day when we would be free of such sales calls. Such a day will bring peace to people who love their privacy.
