Consumer Protection: Zenith Bank Fined For Invading Prospect’s Privacy With Spam Mails

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In a judgement that stunned many business analysts, Zenith Bank Plc has been fined N500, 000 by a high court in the Ogun State of ,Nigeria for sending spam e-mails to a prospective customer, Ms. Omotola Fathiat Quadri.

She had sued Zenith Bank for infringing on her fundamental human right to privacy as stated under Section 37 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended).

According to the report, The plaintiff also alleged that the commercial bank sent her over 300 e-mail messages from February 16 to May 26, 2021, despite the fact that she did not own an account with the bank and messages kept coming in even after she had written to the bank through her solicitors and a petition to both the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), in Abuja, FCT.

She pressed that the court stops the respondent from sending her messages, and also award her N5,000,000 as damages against the bank.

In a counter-affidavit the bank through Clarkson Adebayo, its solicitor, claimed that the applicant’s e-mail address was provided by certain Omotola Rashidat Quadri, a customer meanwhile the bank has stopped sending e-mails to the applicant and contacted the customer to update her account details.

However, the general promotional advertisement was still being sent to the applicant because her e-mail was still registered in the respondent’s database.

The bank insisted that it could be held liable for invasion of privacy for acting in compliance with the e-mail address supplied by its customer.

The presiding judge, Sonia Akinbiyi, delivered the judgment on March 16 by ordering the bank to pay a sum of N500, 000 to the applicant.

The Justice stated: “The admission to sending a plethora of messages and promotional messages even in the face of several letters and petitions against the respondent to stop same violates the fundamental rights of the applicant.

“The application succeeds in its prayers (I) and (2), this court declares that the unsolicited e-mail violates the applicant’s privacy, the respondent is hereby restrained from further sending such unsolicited e-mails in any manner infringing the applicant’s fundamental rights.”

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