Changed Your PayNow Display Name? Your Mobile Number Still Reveals More Than You Think.
PayNow
The awareness of mobile numbers revealing one’s full name has urged many Singaporeans to use a nickname/alias or mask their full name on PayNow. But what good is privatizing one channel while leaving the others exposed inconsistently? I’ll share other popular services that reveal your identity in this post — keeping out other channels such as crowdsourced phone books or the likes of telemarketing databases.
PayLah
While PayNow is offered by the major banks, let’s not forget about DBS’ PayLah (and, in the past, OCBC’s Pay Anyone), which is based on a separate wallet and identity. By default, the account owner’s full name is resolved from the mobile number, even without initiating a payment transfer. Changing a display name is accessible within the PayLah app:
GrabPay
Super apps like Grab offer wallet, payment, and peer-to-peer transfer services. Just like PayLah, the recipient’s name is resolved without making a transfer. Things get interesting here because, based on a small experiment, I’m starting to see different display names on the three mediums of my contacts. Changing the display name is straightforward as well:
ShopeePay
While most people wouldn’t use their real/full names on e-commerce platforms, it serves as a good reminder that mobile numbers are tethered to account names, and a lookup on display names can be performed via the likes of ShopeePay as well.
Disappointment — YouTrip
A resolution of the mobile number on the YouTrip app reveals the initials of the line owner, and any transfers (even 1 cent in any supported currencies) would reveal the recipient’s FULL NAME. The crazy part is that there’s NO way to change this. No reasonable efforts were made to address this when I wrote to them. Instead, my concerns were shelved as a possible consideration under their feature request backlog.
That leaves me with finding a replacement for their services.
Adios.
Privacy by Design
Services such as PayPal and Singtel’s Dash embody privacy by design and only reveal what you know about the number, such as the name you have saved in your contact list. Does it degrade user experience? Not to me, because as a customer, I value security and privacy as much as I value functionality and convenience.
Have I missed out on any similar services? Drop me a comment.
