Privacy group challenges eBay over customers’ bank details
Published September 1st, 2006
Online auction house eBay is to be investigated over complaints that it is breaking the law by making it difficult for customers to remove personal details from its website.
The Information Commissioner has been asked to rule whether the auction site, used by 15 million people in Britain, is in breach of the Data Protection Act.
The investigation follows a complaint from the human rights organisation Privacy International which claims that only the most diligent and skilled internet customers can work out how to delete the information.
Accounts on eBay contain personal data such as bank details, addresses, past purchases and phone numbers.
Yesterday, eBay denied that it was being deliberately obstructive and insisted that instructions for deleting accounts were on its website.
Privacy International’s director, Simon Davies, said eBay was simply a test case.
Removing accounts from other websites — such as Friends Reunited — was just as difficult.
He also claimed that despite help from four internet professionals, he had been unable to delete an account with the online retailer Amazon.
“If you are concerned about privacy you would want to delete your account with eBay if it was no longer in use because it contains details about you and your bank account,” he said. “It is a fundamental right to have control over information about you.
“When a company say they won’t allow you to do that, or when they make it difficult, then your rights are effectively nullified. In an age when there is so much criminal use of personal information it is important that we have full discretion over who has the information.”
Companies may have a financial incentive in keeping customers, he said. The worth of some community websites, such as Friends Reunited, depended on the number of subscribers. Research by Privacy International found that some websites, such as MySpace and YouTube, made it simple to delete accounts if they were no longer needed.
“At the other end of the spectrum, the worst is Amazon,” said Mr Davies.
“We had four trained researchers trying to find anywhere on Amazon to delete accounts. We could not find it. That is unlawful under the Data Protection Act.”
People wanting to buy or sell on eBay have to provide bank account details, phone numbers, their date of birth and addresses. However, once registered, the customer’s home page has no obvious facility to delete the account.
It can be discovered by typing “unsubscribe” into the help section’s search engine or by finding a subsection of the help pages titled Account Information and Billing. If eBay is found to be in breach of the Data Protection Act, the company may be fined.
A spokesman for eBay denied that it was in breach of the Act, or that it was difficult to find information about deleting personal data.
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