Beware! Google Play Store loan apps scams thrive; 29 scam loan apps still available
A week after Pedro Figueroa borrowed 10,000 pesos ($500) from Jose Cash, a popular Mexican lending app, the barrage of online abuse began. A slew of WhatsApp messages swamped his phone, threatening harm - to him and his reputation -if he did not pay.
Figueroa had borrowed the money to tide him over a rough patch, but was soon caught in a cycle of debt and extortion as the app sent ever more menacing messages, including a threat to send a doctored image to all his contacts labeling him a pedophile.
To pay down the debt and escape the stress, 34-year-old Figueroa turned to other digital apps to borrow more money, and in three months, had racked up debts of $75,000 across 27 apps.
All of which pushed him to contemplate suicide.
"I fell into a deep hole of anxiety because of these apps," Figueroa, an IT specialist, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, using a pseudonym for fear of further reprisals.
Figueroa is one of more than 2,230 people who fell prey to fraudulent loan apps in Mexico between June 2021 and January 2022, according to data compiled by the Citizen Council for Justice and Security, an advocacy group based in Mexico City.
The Thomson Reuters Foundation found 29 loan apps with millions of downloads in the Google Play Store that have been reported to the authorities for extortion, fraud, violation of Mexican privacy law, and abusive financial practices.
"We take this issue very seriously and are committed to providing a secure platform for billions of Android users. We have already implemented measures against more than a dozen apps and will continue to investigate," a spokesperson for Google wrote to the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
The explosion of predatory lending apps in Mexico is part of a global trend that
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