Draft policy on ecommerce firms: Strict watch thru’ central platform

All e-commerce companies will soon have to come under one digital platform monitored by multiple state agencies, as the government looks to increase oversight on the sector that has become a hotbed for irregularities in recent months.

At least 13 rogue e-commerce companies wound up with several thousands of crores of taka in liabilities, amplifying the calls for a stringent e-commerce policy.

The agencies are the commerce ministry, the Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC), the Consumer Association of Bangladesh, the Bangladesh Financial Intelligence Unit (BFIU), the law enforcement and detective police, and the National Telecommunication Monitoring Centre (NTMC), according to the draft policy.

The Daily Star has a copy of the draft policy prepared last month by the NTMC.

The digital platform will have detailed information on orders and delivery, information about dealers as well as details of their financial transactions.

One of the major features of the policy is that it will integrate both e-commerce companies and payment gateways to the digital platform through an application programming interface (API), a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to each other.

Since most of the e-commerce platforms conduct their financial transactions with customers and dealers via payment gateways, those need to be API-enabled for quick retrieval of information, according to the policy.

This will allow for easy scrutiny of financial transactions made by the e-commerce companies, it said.

All e-commerce companies will have to register with the digital platform or else they will not be allowed to operate.

When registering, the e-commerce companies must provide information on their business model.

"By business model, we refer to how the company will conduct their business and earn money from their customers, how they will supply their products, how they will conduct financial transactions," says the draft policy.

Before registration, the commerce ministry will verify whether the e-commerce company is conducting any Ponzi scheme or practising multi-level marketing or has any other illegal motive.

It also states that the NTMC will verify the applicant's national identification and passport information and other personal details.

Concurrently, the BFIU will verify the bank details and financial transactions of the proposed company, according to the draft policy.

The law enforcement agencies and detectives will investigate if any criminal activity is taking place.

All of this information will be stored in the BCC's server and will be accessible to the six agencies thanks to the API.

The server will include information regarding completion of orders, courier management, labelling, order invoicing, order tracking, order confirmation and financial transactions.

While the government will have access to such specific data, it does not mean they will always access it, Ziaul Ahsan, director of NTMC, told The Daily Star.

"We can monitor all calls for example, but that does not mean that we do," he said, adding that this is necessary only to track illegal activities.

The information available to each agency will be contingent on its work description, according to the policy.

"Who can see what will be decided by the commerce ministry, which retains the power to give user access permissions."

For example, the BFIU will be able to use the API to pull information about financial transactions for regular scrutiny. They will also be able to see the transaction history.

The law enforcement will be able to see national identity information, passport information and criminal records and verify if the companies are following the commerce ministry's terms and conditions.

They will also be able to see if customers are getting their products within a certain deadline.

Registration will only be provided if the e-commerce companies agree to the rules. All companies will be given a business identification number.

The private stakeholders like the e-commerce companies or the payment system providers have not been consulted yet on the draft policy, Ahsan said.

There are benefits for the companies too: for instance, they can access information about specific products selling well and make business decisions, he added.

The e-commerce companies though expressed concern about the sharing of so much of their data.

"We urge the government to ensure that the data and information of customers do not become public in any way. That data going to the hands of the government is also one way of it becoming public," said Mohammad Sahab Uddin, the vice-president of the e-Commerce Association of Bangladesh.

Currently, the e-commerce sector is being operated using a guideline introduced in July.

Mahmudul Hasan contributed to the report