"Where is the ordering interface?" Ms. Zhang from Jinan, Shandong, traveled to Beijing not long ago. When she scanned the code to place an order at a brand beverage store in a shopping mall in Chaoyang, Beijing, she was upset by the complicated operation interface.

It turned out that after she scanned the code, another QR code popped up repeatedly, showing "Add welfare officer to receive shopping coupons." Ms. Zhang felt that she was only traveling in Beijing and would not use this welfare at all in the future, so she refused to add it. But she could not find the payment interface. After consulting the waiter, she was told that there were three small dots in the inconspicuous upper right corner of the interface. Click the small dot in the middle to place an order.

"Scanning the code to pay is like peeling an onion. There is another layer after peeling off one layer. QR codes should bring convenience to consumers, but why have they become a "stumbling block" instead?" Ms. Zhang complained.

A recent investigation by a reporter from the "Legal Daily" found that some public places such as restaurants and parking lots have cumbersome online payment operations. Some require following the official account or downloading the App to place an order and pay, and some will pop up various commercial advertisements.

Experts interviewed believe that this move by merchants implies marketing ideas such as placing advertisements, analyzing and integrating customer information, and "portraying" users. Most ordering programs hide the content that should be clearly stated in the "Agreement Rules" and "Privacy Policy", or use extremely small fonts and other inconspicuous methods, so that consumers cannot easily identify or obtain the content that the operator wants to inform. These practices infringe on the legitimate rights and interests of consumers, and relevant departments are urgently needed to increase rectification efforts.

Clicking through layers to pay

Many forced attention routines

Mr. Su from Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, bluntly said that he "suffered from QR codes for a long time" and "all ads after scanning the code". Many times, after he scanned the QR code, a small program appeared, but an ad would automatically jump when he clicked it, and he would immediately enter another page if he accidentally touched it.

"As long as my phone vibrates slightly, this mechanism can sense it and automatically jump to the ad. If it is a simple web page advertisement, I still have the right to choose to close or refuse, but this behavior of triggering advertisements through slight vibrations of the phone is difficult to turn off." Mr. Su said.

Recently, the reporter visited many supermarkets in Dongcheng, Xicheng and Chaoyang, Beijing, and found that some stores set up cumbersome operating procedures for customers in the process of scanning codes to order meals, and some even required customers to follow the official account forcibly, "If you don't follow, you can't consume."

In a beverage shop in Xicheng, Beijing, you cannot order food without scanning the code to follow the official account. After following the official account, the reporter immediately received a franchise advertisement and a message about forwarding a free drink. At the bottom of the official account, from left to right, there are three options: "I want to order", "Member Center" and "Brand Franchise". Finally, click "I want to order" to come to the ordering mini program.

"Sometimes when I get medicine in the hospital, there is a machine nearby that allows you to scan a code and get a free plastic bag. You often need to follow a public account to get one. But I often encounter a "trap within a trap": after I scan the code and follow it, I need to follow another one. Only after following several in a row can I get a plastic bag." Ms. Zhao, a Beijing citizen, complained that most of the content on the public account is traffic-generating advertising, and there may even be some unhealthy and vulgar content, and it may also lead to virus links.

Ms. Zhao said that compared to this "trap within a trap", she is more willing to accept the payment method, "Instead of frequently clicking, following, watching ads, and even providing personal information such as phone numbers and nicknames, it is better to pay with coins."

"Once, I parked in a hospital to pay. The QR code there will induce the activation of an automatic deduction of 19.9 yuan per month. Fortunately, I looked carefully. If I took the pop-up payment page as the payment for that parking, I would probably have to wait until the next month when the automatic deduction occurs to find it." An interviewee said that when parking, you must enter the parking space number and scan the code on your mobile phone to pay, which is not very friendly to the elderly. His father has presbyopia. He doesn't need to wear glasses when driving but he must wear them when looking at his phone. He struggled for a long time for the license plate number.

As for the reasons why merchants let consumers pay attention to other information during the code scanning process, the experts interviewed believe that there are factors such as market promotion, increasing the number of fans on the merchant's own platform, saving marketing costs, collecting consumer data information, and establishing connections with consumers.

In the view of Gao Qing, an associate professor at China University of Political Science and Law, there are more implicit marketing ideas. On the one hand, merchants can set up a membership system in the code scanning ordering system, configure member deposits, coupons, etc., to enhance customer stickiness. On the other hand, with the help of the code scanning service to guide consumers to pay attention or authorize, merchants can collect massive information data and analyze and integrate them, more accurately "portrait" users, understand the value, behavior, needs, preferences, etc. of target users, and push messages such as event promotions, new product promotions or other commercial advertisements to consumers, and convert data traffic into real money.

"After letting consumers follow the official account, we can collect consumers' mobile phone numbers, geographic locations and other personal information, which can help businesses conduct further consumer group analysis and facilitate the push of personalized advertising and other marketing activities." said Wang Yegang, associate professor of the School of Law of the Central University of Finance and Economics.

Collecting information beyond the scope

Suspected of infringing on customer rights

"Follow the official account applet-register an account-find the page but can't find the parking payment-find the parking payment-enter the license plate number-pay", Mr. Hu from Jiangmen, Guangdong has become accustomed to this set of operations, and sometimes there may be "episodes": during the payment process, a discount coupon may pop up automatically, and consumers click to find that it is a "pit", and after exiting the program, they have to re-enter the license plate number. The whole process takes at least three to five minutes, and the parking lot generally has a poor signal and slow Internet speed, which is extremely time-consuming.

In addition, he also found that a local parking lot applet had the problem of exposing personal past travel information. The applet has one code for each car, and the code is scanned to pay. His friend scanned the QR code to pay the fee, "and after paying, I could actually see my personal vehicle's previous payment itineraries, including the start and end parking times, locations, durations, etc."

The reporter found that in some consumer places, after scanning the QR code, prompts such as "You need to obtain personal information to become a member before you can order food" and "Obtain geographic location" will pop up. If consumers do not agree to obtain personal information, they will not be able to receive services.

Ms. Yan, a resident of Haidian District, Beijing, once went to a restaurant near her home for dinner, and the waiter suggested that she scan the code to order food. After Ms. Yan scanned the code, a member registration interface appeared, in which she needed to fill in the customer's name, gender, birthday, mobile phone number, password, verification code and other information.

"I have always disliked the requirement to provide various personal information when ordering food. This information has nothing to do with my meal! When filling in information before, I often filled in a wrong name or birthday. This time, I have to fill in more information, which makes me more and more disgusted." Ms. Yan complained, "The "entering verification code" seems to be to ensure that I fill in the correct mobile phone number."

On social platforms, many netizens reported that they were harassed by stores after providing information such as mobile phone numbers when ordering online-"After scanning the code to place an order, a merchant added me as a friend by searching through my phone number" "Today, I scanned the code to eat and rated the store three and a half stars. At about 10 o'clock in the evening, the merchant called and asked me to give it five stars."

The interviewed experts believe that the merchant's actions may constitute infringement. Gao Qing analyzed that "forced transactions" not only include the mandatory transaction conditions (such as pricing, quantity, quality, etc.), but also the mandatory or disguised mandatory transaction methods. "In addition to traditional standard terms such as minimum consumption, no bringing in your own alcohol, and corkage fees, regulations that force or covertly force the transaction method should also be regarded as standard terms. If a party providing the standard terms exempts itself from liability, increases the liability of the other party, or excludes the other party's main rights, the terms are invalid." Gao Qing believes that in practice, most ordering procedures hide the content that should be clearly stated in the "consent rules" and "privacy policy", or use other inconspicuous methods such as extremely small fonts, so that consumers cannot easily identify or obtain the content that the operator wants to inform. "Under the premise that the operator has not fulfilled the obligation to express it, it is impossible to conclude that the consumer agrees to collect personal information." He further mentioned that the "minimum necessary" data collection principle is stipulated in the Personal Information Protection Law. In the dining scene, the customer's name, gender, social account, and phone number are all personal information that is not directly related to dining. In general, merchants only need to know "table number + number of diners + number of dishes" to provide catering services. If the operator obtains personal information beyond the reasonable scope of the above provisions in the process of setting up scanning code ordering and downloading apps, it will be suspected of excessively obtaining consumer information.

"Consumers have the right to decide whether to authorize their personal information. After scanning the code in some places, consumers face the risk of personal information leakage." In Gao Qing's view, the transaction method adopted by consumers depends entirely on their personal wishes. Operators (especially operators in the public service industry) should improve supporting measures, realize "smart consumption", and retain manual channels. They should not infringe on consumer rights by concealing or forcing them.

"The merchant's processing of consumer personal information should be limited to the content of the service." Wang Yegang believes that if the merchant does not clearly inform consumers of the purpose, method and scope of collecting the other party's information, or collects information without the explicit consent of consumers, it may also affect the validity of the contract. If merchants gain competitive advantages and exclude competitors in this way, it may constitute unfair competition.

Set merchant qualification thresholds

Clear online operation specifications

How to simplify consumption and regulate the chaos of scanning consumption? The experts interviewed believe that efforts need to be made from the government, merchants, consumers and other levels.

Gao Qing suggested that the boundaries and conditions for merchants to collect and use personal information when providing services should be clarified, the qualification threshold for merchants to use QR code services should be set, and the chaos of using QR codes to obtain personal information in violation of regulations should be severely cracked down. Formulate or revise service specifications for the Internet catering industry, establish a legal framework for Internet catering services, clarify the operating specifications for online ordering, payment and other services, regulate the promotion of merchants' public accounts, and prohibit forcing consumers to follow public accounts or download apps as a prerequisite for providing services.

"Develop relevant compliance guidance documents for different sub-sectors. For example, the Shanghai Market Supervision Bureau, together with relevant departments, has formulated compliance guidelines for personal information protection in various industries for online ordering, supermarket shopping, catering services, automobile sales industry, parking lot scanning and payment and other consumer fields." Gao Qing said.

Last July, the Shanghai Consumer Protection Committee and the Shanghai Catering and Cooking Industry Association formulated and issued the "Shanghai Online Ordering Service Consumer Personal Information Protection Compliance Guidelines", which stipulates some types of personal information that are collected beyond the scope, and clearly states that the requirements for obtaining "personal identity and property related information", "precise location information", "information obtained from associated logins" after scanning the code are all beyond the scope of personal information collection, which not only violates the principle of minimum necessity, but also infringes on consumers' right to choose.

"Increase the punishment of merchants who violate the rules, such as fines, revocation of business licenses, etc. Carry out special rectification actions regularly, and conduct centralized inspections on the scanning consumption links of catering and other service industries. Require merchants and third-party platforms to file before launching scanning consumption services, clarify the merchant's service content and information collection scope, etc. Merchants who have violated the rules many times will be included in the "blacklist" to restrict them from conducting related operations." Wang Yegang added.

Wang Yegang believes that merchants should strengthen self-discipline and optimize services. Merchants should conduct multiple audits on the scanning and consumption process to eliminate unnecessary and unreasonable ordering requirements such as attention and downloading. They should realize that sustainable operations and considerable profits need to rely on high-quality products and professional services, rather than relying too much on the accurate delivery of consumer personal information. If the scanning service is still adopted, the interface and operation process can be greatly simplified, unnecessary collection of consumer information can be removed, and advertising push and marketing interference can be reduced.

"Encourage technological innovation and application, and use more convenient and safe ordering methods, such as popularizing independent smart ordering equipment, and physically reducing the use of consumers' personal devices, thereby reducing the risk of leakage of consumers' personal information." Gao Qing said.

Wang Yegang suggested that consumers should enhance their awareness of personal information protection, be able to find out which behaviors of merchants are unreasonable scanning requirements, and realize that this may lead to information leakage and information infringement. Faced with unreasonable requirements such as forced scanning and downloading of apps by some merchants, they should be rejected in time, and they can change the consumption occasion or complain through legal channels. (Reporter Wen Lijuan, trainee reporter Ding Yi)

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