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Leopold Chen

Three domestic helpers in Hong Kong have been sacked and issued warning letters after providing their employers’ personal data without consent to secure loans, resulting in the households being harassed by debt collectors.
Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Ada Chung Lai-ling said on Tuesday that, in each of the three cases, the names, phone numbers and addresses of employers were originally obtained solely for work purposes.
“However, the domestic helpers in question subsequently provided the employers’ personal data to financial institutions for applying for loans,” she said. “And I would say that this went beyond the original purpose for which the data was collected.”
In one of the cases, which happened in 2025, the helper provided her employers’ phone number and address to a moneylender in the Philippines as proof of work, but later defaulted on payments due to the high interest rate.
The moneylender then texted the employer, requesting that the helper be reminded to make the payments, and threatened to send debt collectors to the address if the transaction was not completed by a deadline.
The other two cases took place in January and May this year and involved the helpers disclosing their employers’ personal information to several financial institutions without consent to apply for loans, resulting in their employers being harassed.
All three helpers were eventually fired and received warning letters from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data.
According to the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, the commissioner may issue enforcement orders to those who violate the legislation.
Failure to comply can lead to criminal liability, resulting in a maximum punishment of two years in jail and a HK$100,000 (US$12,800) fine for repeat offences.
Chung also revealed that the privacy watchdog had received 21 inquiries and complaints about helpers’ unauthorised use or disclosure of employers’ personal data to financial institutions in the first half of this year, surpassing the 18 recorded in 2025.
But she anticipated the number of cases would stabilise in the second half of this year as the government stepped up regulatory efforts against moneylenders.

Under new rules that took effect earlier this month, financial institutions are banned from requesting borrowers to provide loan referees. Anyone earning no more than HK$6,000 per month is also only allowed to borrow up to 35 per cent of their monthly income.
The cap is set at 40 per cent for those making between HK$6,001 and HK$12,000 a month.
Chung urged domestic workers to obtain their employers’ explicit consent before using their personal data and to avoid recklessly disclosing information to financial institutions to obtain loans.
She also encouraged employers to remind helpers not to use their private information for purposes not already agreed on and to carefully handle documents provided by domestic workers that required their signatures.
Separately, the watchdog also published a guideline for organisations on protecting personal data when using agentic AI tools.
Chung said such artificial intelligence (AI) tools posed a higher risk of a data breach as they could act autonomously on behalf of users to execute various tasks, such as handling emails, making restaurant bookings and even settling payments.
The office’s nine recommendations began with three core practices: avoiding excessive or arbitrary collection of personal data for such tools, telling users that the software was in use, and ensuring accuracy of private information with context-based fine-tuning and human review.
Another three focused on regularly deleting data deemed no longer relevant, ensuring all personal information was used with consent and verifying the systems’ codes to avoid any malicious programmes.
The final three recommendations covered choosing systems with good privacy protection settings, conducting continuous risk assessments and providing training for employees.
“If the decisions made by the agentic AI may have a significant impact on individuals … organisations should then adopt a ‘human-in-the-loop’ approach to retain final control over the decision-making process to prevent and mitigate AI-induced errors and automation bias,” said Fiona Lai Ho-yan, assistant privacy commissioner for legal affairs.


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3 helpers sacked, issued warnings over use of employer data to secure loans

A watchdog has urged domestic workers to obtain their employers’ explicit consent before using their personal data and to avoid recklessly disclosing information to financial institutions to obtain loans. Photo: Getty Images

Fiona Lai, assistant privacy commissioner for legal affairs, also separately spoke about the importance of using a “human-in-the-loop” approach when using agentic AI tools. Photo: Leopold Chen

Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data Ada Chun says that each of the cases involved names, phone numbers and addresses originally obtained solely for employment purposes. Photo: Leopold Chen

Two of the cases saw helpers disclose their employers’ personal information to several financial institutions without consent to apply for loans. Photo: Getty Images

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News

Hong Kong

Law and Crime

Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog highlights three cases and says helpers’ actions led to their employers being harassed by debt collectors


Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog highlights three cases and says helpers’ actions led to their employers being harassed by debt collectors.


The Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data

Ada Chung Lai-ling

Artificial intelligence (AI)

Crime

3 helpers sacked, issued warnings over use of employer data to secure loans

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog highlights three cases and says helpers’ actions led to their employers being harassed by debt collectors

Hong Kong’s privacy watchdog highlights three cases and says helpers’ actions led to their employers being harassed by debt collectors