Alipay’s 1 billion red envelope attracted the ＂wool party＂ official： 800 accounts have been processed.
At the end of this year, Alipay’s money-making red envelope activity is still in full swing: not only the merchants in offline stores spare no effort to invite everyone to pay with Alipay red envelopes, but also the circle of friends in WeChat is occupied by various news of Alipay red envelopes, and the invitation text messages under the banner of Alipay red envelopes are even uninvited every day.
The original intention of this red envelope campaign launched by Alipay is to popularize mobile payment, attract more new users, and at the same time attract a large number of "wool parties" without any suspense. Now, it seems that the "Wool Party" is indeed rich in harvest: according to the screenshots circulated on the Internet, some Alipay users got 1.378 million yuan red envelopes in a short time, and some got 525,000 yuan red envelopes, showing that there are still 100,000+red envelopes on their way.
Alipay official said recently that it has been found that some people promote this function through spamming, and even worse, they use [Alipay] as a signature to spamming, which destroys the user’s experience of participating in activities and affects Alipay’s brand image. The Beijing Youth Daily reporter learned that there are currently 800 abusive SMS accounts that Alipay has caught and handled. Alipay will continue to use technical means to prevent and deal with this kind of behavior.
Netizens make red envelopes and earn more than 100 yuan a month.
On November 15th this year, Alipay announced the launch of the first free red envelope that can make money. According to the activity rules, users can invite other users to use Alipay in the physical store by clicking passwords, QR code pictures, activity posters, links, etc. After success, they can get a reward. Users can generate a tickle password through Alipay APP, and they can share it with WeChat friends, throw it into WeChat group and share it with friends. Friends can copy this tickle password, and then open Alipay to receive a red envelope. When friends pay offline, they use this red envelope, and the owner of the tickle password can also get the corresponding reward.
Alipay said that the activity of scanning code to receive red envelopes, that is, "making money red envelopes", was mainly launched for small businesses. When users pay online, merchants can recommend users to scan the code to get red envelopes, and merchants will get corresponding rewards after users use them. The red envelope money received by users and the bounty received by merchants are all borne by Alipay, which is to further popularize mobile payment among small businessmen. At present, there are tens of millions of offline businesses using red envelope codes to promote mobile payment to users, so that more middle-aged and elderly groups and urban and rural residents can accept and use mobile payment.
For the majority of users, this Alipay red envelope activity is tantamount to picking up money. Other apps send red envelopes either to invite friends or to register new members. This time, Alipay issued a cash-filled red envelopes without a threshold, without any additional conditions. Just copy it and use it with a brush. Some new Alipay users also found that it is easy to receive a red envelope of more than ten dollars. Even if the red envelope is only a few cents, one per day, it will accumulate over time.
People who issue red envelope passwords are also more "ways to make money." Netizen Ms. Wang said that this activity can really make money. For more than 20 days, she has forwarded relevant information through the WeChat circle of friends, and has received nearly 300 bounty so far, earning more than 100 yuan. She can also see who received the red envelope, because it was sent in a circle of friends, so it was basically someone she knew. The lowest is 1.1 yuan and the highest is 3.9 yuan.
"Wool Party" made a profit of nearly 1,000 yuan in 3 days by texting.
Alipay’s activities are so kind and friendly to users that it naturally becomes a rare gold mine in the eyes of the "wool party".
In the last 8 days, the reporter of Beiqing Daily has received 8 short messages about receiving Alipay red envelopes. The sending numbers basically start with "106575" or "10690", and the titles are nothing more than "New Year’s Day Red Packet", "Alipay" and "Alipay Red Packet". Everyone asked to copy the SMS and open Alipay to receive the red envelope. The lowest amount of the red envelope was 200 yuan, and the highest was 888 yuan or 1225 yuan.
Almost all colleagues and friends around the reporter received similar text messages, and some received several messages a day. The reporter tried it, and these short messages can indeed receive Alipay red envelopes.
In the screenshots circulated on the Internet, some people got a super big red envelope of 1.378 million yuan, while others got a red envelope of 525,000 yuan, and at the same time showed that there were "100,000+"red envelopes on their way. Obviously, this is not something that ordinary "retail investors" can accomplish.
According to industry insiders, for the "wool party", using Alipay’s red envelope rules, we can find people to send marketing messages in batches to spread their passwords, so we can wait for red envelopes to roll in at home.
Some service providers who provide accurate short message marketing said that they can provide mass designated information services, including the information of Alipay red envelopes. As long as the short message content related to your Alipay red envelope is generated, it can be mass-sent to mobile phone users with designated segments. The price is between 3 cents and 6 cents. If you buy 1 million pieces, each piece costs only 3 cents.
Everyone’s current Alipay red envelope messages should be sent by these service providers. Send so many text messages, someone will always copy the red envelope, and the person who sends the text message can take advantage of it. The cost of a few cents each is exchanged for a reward that may be a few cents to tens of dollars. No wonder some people make a profit of nearly 1,000 yuan in just three days.
Excessive promotion of the account will greatly reduce the commission.
"The message that received the Alipay red envelope was not officially sent by us. We are also deeply disturbed by it. " Regarding the behavior of the "wool party", Alipay responded that Alipay would never encourage this over-promotion.
A few days ago, Ant Financial’s open platform issued an announcement that "it is forbidden to use spam messages and other ways to destroy the user experience": "Recently, we found that some people promoted this function through spam messages. We would like to remind you that Alipay will never encourage this over-promotion. If complaints and other adverse effects are caused by harassing users, we will take penalties that are not limited to stopping activities and canceling all rewards. If you use the [Alipay] signature without permission, you need to bear all legal responsibilities arising from it. "
It is understood that Alipay is preventing and dealing with it through technical means. Once it is found that someone is harassing users by spamming messages, it will take measures such as greatly reducing the commission to make it unprofitable and even revoking the qualification to participate in the event. At the same time, Alipay has also established a model to analyze improper promotion behavior. When it is found that the behavior characteristics of receiving red envelopes are different from those of receiving normal red envelopes, it will also deal with them. At present, 800 accounts with improper promotion behavior have been found and dealt with.
How does the "Wool Party" "bonus hunter"
The so-called "wool party" refers to those groups who are keen to participate in various business promotion activities and enjoy preferential benefits. Small to online stores, physical stores, bank credit card promotions, big to mutual gold platform promotion activities, such as interest rate hikes, red envelopes, etc., are all places where the "wool party" shows its talents.
"In the morning, I ate ice cream for free with the consumption code sent by the bank, and then I bought 300 yuan goods with 10 points in the supermarket. Credit card for lunch and a big meal at half price. After dinner, I robbed electronic coupons, and 18 yuan watched movies. When going home by subway, use ‘ Scan the code politely ’ I bought two cans of lemon tea on the vending machine, which is 2 yuan in total. I spent a total of 51 yuan today and enjoyed a consumption experience worth 463 yuan. " This is a classic description of the "happy life of the wool party" widely circulated on the Internet.
The "wool party" is also divided into genres. Earlier, the "Wool Party" was mainly active in the O2O platform or e-commerce platform, and also specialized in studying bank card concessions. With the development of internet finance in 2015, some online lending platforms often launch some lucrative activities to attract investors, such as registration and certification awards, recharge and cashback, and bid rebates. The "wool party" gradually developed from scattered individuals to groups.
In recent years, the "wool party" has increasingly shown the characteristics of specialization, gangs and regionalization. What is even more frightening is that they often wander in the gray area of law and are often only one step away from fraud.
In order to facilitate bonus hunter, the "Wool Party" must form a gang, and there are countless social groups of "Wool Party" sharing preferential information on the Internet.
How do they cooperate with each other to "bonus hunter"? For example, some P2P online lending platforms stipulate that new users will be presented to 15 yuan after real-name registration, and they can withdraw cash when they are in 20 yuan. QQ group composed of "Wool Party" will release this information from time to time, and make everyone earn enough money in 20 yuan to successfully withdraw cash by signing in, doing tasks and sharing. Generally, the commission for inviting new users to register varies from 5 yuan to 30 yuan. Some people can earn about 1,000 yuan of "wool" every month by registering for cash back and earning commissions.
Technical school buys a large number of cheap smartphone registration accounts.
After all, it is too slow to "commit crimes" by online groups. The "wool party" will also resort to technical means at great expense, for example, buying a large number of cheap smartphones to register accounts, buying a large number of small mobile phone cards, and successfully realizing the function of receiving verification codes by SMS in batches through some professional software to register and sign in.
SMS marketing is also a keen technical means of "Wool Party", but it may also be just a link in the huge industrial chain of "Wool Party". An online survey report on the "wool party" pointed out that in the past few years, the "wool party" has developed into a huge force, which has spawned various gray industries in the upstream, such as code receiving platforms, commercial registration machines, group control systems, agency platforms, information merchants and account merchants. In the whole "bonus hunter" industrial chain structure, mobile phone card vendors belong to the most upstream group.
How lethal is the "wool party"? In September 2015, a P2P platform in Guangdong made up its mind to thoroughly investigate the "wool party" and invited external technology companies to monitor it. In a promotion activity, the data provided by the external technical cooperation company showed that nearly 70% of the customers who participated in the promotion activity were "wool party".
Industry analysts said that although the Alipay red envelope campaign attracted a large number of "wool parties", it was still different from the P2P platform "bonus hunter". After all, the operation of the "Wool Party" on Alipay red envelopes did not harm the funds of normal users. To some extent, they helped Alipay spread widely. Of course, their short messages do cause harassment to users, but so far, there is no clear regulation on short message marketing. From sending messages in groups to buying mobile phone numbers, there are no clear legal provisions on SMS marketing at present, especially when the information receiver has not suffered property losses but has been harassed, it is difficult to defend his rights. To thoroughly punish the harassment behavior of the "wool party", in addition to the careful consideration of the activists when formulating rules, it also needs the cooperation of all sectors of society.
Text/Reporter Cheng Wei Photo courtesy/vision china