The Government’s priority is to encourage e-commerce without any increased risk of frauds, said the Minister of Industry, Commerce and Tourism, Zayed bin Rashid Al Zayani, yesterday.
He was inaugurating the three-day annual Consumer Protection Exhibition under the banner ‘e-commerce and e-fraud awareness’ at the City Center Mall.
The event was part of the ongoing efforts towards protection of consumer interests in line with celebrating World Consumer Rights Day and Gulf Consumer Protection Week.
“One of our priority is to encourage e-commerce and the use of e-transaction but at the same time we don’t want an increased rate of frauds,” he said.
“Part of our mandate is to educate the public and we have taken an extra initiative to make the Consumer Protection Directorate from a reactive to a proactive unit. Moreover, we have launched a lot of awareness campaigns for the consumers as well as the merchants. We realise the transaction takes place between two parties and we need to educate both the parties about their rights and obligations so that they can be offered the protection in their transaction,” Al Zayani added.
The exhibition, held under the patronage of Al Zayani, in cooperation with the Ministry of the Interior and the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) aims to spread awareness about consumer protection and growing crimes in e-transactions and to further educate the general public on related topics.
“In terms of awareness, a theme like this is an investment as we need to focus on such issues. In Bahrain, we are really pleased that the government entities along with the private sector are working together to establish a secure umbrella for all transactions for the consumers,” said Sinan Ali Al Jabri, Director of Consumer Protection Directorate in the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism.
“It further is a great platform to display the efforts of such entities in order to protect consumer privacy and help them from any e-frauds on daily basis. Obviously, there is a huge threat of e-frauds internally, but all the entities here are fully aware and it’s our responsibility to make people aware on how to treat such threats as there is not just one kind of e-frauds there are many,” he said.
“The challenge varies from situation to situation as in e-commerce, the public is dealing with just a screen or an app and how we can adopt our policies and regulations to maintain the protection of the consumers thus making public aware on such issues is extremely crucial,” Sinan added.
“The CBB is pleased to support the Ministry’s initiatives and efforts in raising awareness and educating consumers on sound practices. Together we seek to ensure that consumers take reasonable measures to protect their personal information and financial data, and exercise due care and caution in their electronic financial dealings,” said Khalid Hamad, Executive Director of Banking Supervision at CBB.
Director General of Anti-corruption, Economic, and Electronic Security, Brigadier Bassam Al Mi’raj and representatives of participating bodies and sponsors were present at the event where the minister was updated on the financial institutions’ measures to address e-fraudsters, whose tools have become sophisticated, which require raising awareness of the same among e-shoppers.
The event introduced e-commerce applications and showcased government agencies’ efforts to counter e-fraud, in addition to raising e-shoppers awareness of e-fraud.
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