Opera Reportedly Offering Predatory Loan Apps with Interest Rates Up to 876%

Opera — a freeware web browser for Microsoft Windows — is allegedly offering predatory loans through Android apps running four Android apps aimed at India, Republic of kenya and Nigeria (CashBean, OKash, OPay and OPesa) that appear to exist in direct violation of Google Play Shop policies, forbidding predatory loans and deceptive descriptions.

CashBean is an instant personal loan platform for Indian mobile users. The application process takes three steps with minimal documentation and in around x minutes, the approved loan amount is transferred to the applicant's bank account.

According to a report by Hindenburg Research, the visitor's losses in browser revenue have apparently led it to create multiple loan apps with brusque payment windows and interest rates of 365-876 per cent, which are in violation of new Play Shop rules Google enacted last year, Android Law reported on Monday.

It is pertinent to note that that Opera is not doing well in the era of Google Chrome authorization.

Opera became a public visitor in mid-2017, shortly after it was purchased by a China-based investor group.

The listing for 'OKash' stated its loans range from 91-365 days (the page now says 61-365 days), but an email response from the company stated it only offered loans from 15-29 days — significantly lower than the 60-24-hour interval minimum enforced past Google.

All of Opera's other apps were also establish to exist in violation to varying extents, the report added.

Opera has since issued a statement saying that it "believes that the [Hinderburg] report contains numerous errors, unsubstantiated statements, and misleading conclusions and interpretations regarding the business of and events relating to the Visitor."