MANILA, Philippines – A lawmaker from the House minority formally asked the chamber to look into the irregular fund transfers that gripped e-wallet platform GCash earlier this week.

House Deputy Minority Leader Bernadette Herrera of party-list group Bagong Henerasyon said on Wednesday, May 10, that she filed House Resolution No. 963 because she was not satisfied with “inconsistent” statements issued by GCash to clarify what caused the anomalous transactions.

She wants officers of GCash, G-Xchange, Mynt, Globe Telecom, Ayala Corporation, and Ant Financial to face the House and thoroughly explain the unauthorized deductions that alarmed app users.

Herrera also wants the House to seek recommendations from government agencies, such as the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Department of Trade and Industry, and National Privacy Commission.

“Resolved further that the House of Representatives explore legislative measures that will strengthen the safeguards and protections for GCash users and other digital payment platform users against unauthorized deductions and other forms of fraud or abuse,” the resolution read.

GCash vice president for corporate communications Gilda Maquilan said earlier on Wednesday that the culprit was a fraudster who was able to phish information from customers through a link sent out to them.

But she insisted there was no hacking, as only less than a thousand out of GCash’s 81 million users had been affected.

After users complained online about the fund deductions, GCash conducted “preventive maintenance,” making the platform inaccessible for hours on Tuesday, May 9. The amounts transferred were eventually returned to customers. – Rappler.com