Disruption of the payment portal of businesses with the occurrence of disruption in the system of symbols and police of places

According to the report of the financial news, finally, according to the follow-ups carried out by the e-commerce development center (as the main custodian of granting this symbol to internet businesses), it is clear that following the changes made by the local police in some licensing criteria, the number of competences Businesses have been rejected and as a result of their token cancellation, the provided internet payment portal has also been blocked.

Late last week, the news of a disruption that blocked the payment gateways of thousands of internet businesses once again put the problems governing this ecosystem in the center of attention. For months, with extensive filtering applied to various foreign platforms, the access of internet businesses to various tools and popular social networks has been in the most limited possible state, and this has greatly hindered the advancement of internet businesses.
At the same time, the requirement to receive this symbol and subjecting the activity of online payment portals to having such a confirmation has put another burden on the shoulders of the activists in this field, contrary to all the oppositions that were made with the implementation of such a requirement. The 72-hour disruption that lasted from Tuesday to Thursday last week and disrupted the operation of the payment portal of more than three thousand Internet businesses is only one of the problems that the country’s digital ecosystem activists are dealing with, and it seems that a specific entity is also responsible. It does not take responsibility for the losses caused by such requirements. According to the estimates made by the secretary of the country’s fintech association, it seems that this recent limited disruption has caused at least 50 billion tomans to the businesses involved in this incident. However, it seems that there is no determination to answer from any specific institution to compensate for such losses, and in the days when trade unions are in a period of weakness, there is no one to answer the demands of digital ecosystem businesses against such losses.

No one is responsible for business losses
According to the statements made by the managers of some businesses, the online payment portal of a large number of stores was accompanied by disturbances since Tuesday, which failed the customers of these businesses to complete their purchase process. Finally, according to the follow-ups carried out by the e-commerce development center (as the main trustee of granting this symbol to internet businesses), it is clear that following the changes made by the local police in some licensing criteria, the competence of a number of businesses was rejected and in As a result of their cancellation, the provided internet payment portal has also been blocked. Mohammad Javad Hadi, Vice President of Business Facilitation and Development of Applications of E-Commerce Development Center, in response to “Economy World”‘s follow-up on the problem, considered this disruption to be a routine matter that occurs in administrative systems and is not the responsibility of E-Commerce Development Center. . He emphasizes that this center has tried to return the systems to the state before the disruption as soon as possible in order to solve the problems of businesses and that the problems that sometimes arise in the systems of institutions related to this center should not be blamed on the center. However, the internet businesses consider this center responsible for providing this symbol and emphasize that now that such a disruption has caused financial loss to them, naturally, someone should be held accountable.

Mustafa Amiri, the CEO of Zarinpal, announced that the operation of more than 3,000 businesses was disrupted for about 72 hours as a result of such a disruption, telling “Economist World”: All these incidents occurred in the circumstances that in the initial follow-ups we had from the Business Development Center. They denied the existence of any problem in their systems and emphasized that the disrupted businesses were problematic. However, later it became clear that the implementation of some changes by the local police has led to such a problem. Amiri, in analyzing the dimensions of such an event, says: The question that arises is that the e-commerce development center, which has been identified as the implementer of the plan to grant the electronic trust symbol to internet businesses, is really looking for development in this space, or is it just a response to The concerns of governance and conducting inquiries and coordination of government institutions. The Secretary of the Fintech Association continues to emphasize: without a doubt, none of the ecosystem activists are against the legalization and organization of businesses, and we all believe that such a center should have sufficient legal authority to deal with violators; But the problem that exists is that carrying out some extra-legal actions or unplanned actions has caused many losses to the businesses in this area and has put them on the verge of closure.

Stating that the lack of information in carrying out such measures has created many problems for the activists in this field, Amiri says: For example, in this recent case, without any prior notice or proper response, there was a disruption in the functioning of businesses, and finally, in order to clarify the story of What’s going on, people had to make repeated calls and follow up the story to find out the root of the problem; This is while if blocking and restrictions are going to be applied, naturally, advance warning should be given and appropriate information should be given regarding what is going to happen. The secretary of the country’s fintech association estimated the loss of at least 50 billion tomans to businesses during the outage hours of payment gateways and says: who should be responsible for such a loss? Amiri believes that even if a business is a violator, it should be dealt with and fined according to a specific process; Not that the whole business will be closed all at once and without any notice. This activist of the country’s start-up ecosystem states: Such behavior towards businesses that are barely surviving these days is far from fair and moral and is not digestible in any way.

Abuse of the weakening of trade unions
The problems caused by the requirement to receive this symbol by internet businesses are only a part of the many problems that activists in this field are dealing with, and recently it has been heard that even some internet stores have been accused of selling contraband or not having enough coverage of the photos published as models. have been threatened with closure and filtering. Referring to the problems that have plagued Internet businesses, Reza Alfat Nasab, a member of the board of directors of the Virtual Business Union, told “Economic World” that: the transparent nature of Internet businesses has caused more sensitivity and strictness to be applied to them. He adds: “Now we are witnessing that, for example, some businesses are being accused of selling so-called contraband goods and are being threatened with filtering the store and closing it down. This is while the same products are simply bought and sold in the offline market and there is no conflict.”

Alfat Nasab believes that with the problems created for the internet business union in the last two years, the vacancy of a demanding body is strongly felt. The state of the internet business union has made there is no voice to demand and defend the rights of internet businesses. He stated that before at least the presence of members from the “real private sector” had created a path to follow up the problems of this trade, he adds: now the activity of the Internet Business Union is limited to the presence of several people appointed by the ministry, and the vacancies of groups that The real desire of the activists of this sector to be a voice to solve the problems of the ecosystem is strongly felt.

He states that the promotion of such a situation is probably a response to the criticisms that this union had in the recent period regarding issues such as the protection plan, and now the intention may be to advance only the things that are approved by appointing specific people and appointing them. . Although policymakers and the government repeatedly chant to support Internet businesses and the development of the digital economy, the persistence of problems in various sectors, such as limited Internet access and obstacles such as the requirement to obtain certain licenses, have made entrepreneurs and activists of this ecosystem more difficult. . They emphasize that if these problems continue, they will probably be forced to surrender and migrate.