Debtors who cannot keep up with payments can face horrors. First, there are the debt collectors. Agencies that employ them are becoming more professional. But late payers are still prone to abuse, especially if they have borrowed from shady people. State-controlled media say the collectors’ tactics have included threatening debtors with red liquids while claiming to have HIV. Two years ago a 22-year-old man was jailed for life after stabbing and killing a collector who, he alleged, had exposed himself to his mother (after an outcry, his sentence was cut to five years). Some collectors have worked out how to track their targets by hacking their instant-messaging apps. In February police said they had arrested a man who was selling people’s locations for one yuan per pinpoint.
Then there are the lenders themselves. Disreputable ones have required borrowers to surrender the contacts stored on their mobile phones, so that family and colleagues can be hassled if payments are missed. Others have asked female borrowers to submit photos of themselves with no clothes on, to be released if they default. Reports abound of suicides by women in debt who fear being subjected to such humiliation. Some have been forced to provide sexual favours in return for having their photos kept under wraps.
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