'Cedok-cedok' TikTok trend may give way to upsurge in online fraud cases

SHAH ALAM - Customers who partake in the “cedok- cedok” sales trend could risk getting scammed by online vendors.

The trend was feared to result in fraudulent activities where customers would not get what they paid for or what was being advertised.

According to a statement by the Communications and Multimedia Content Forum of Malaysia (Content Forum), in many cases, customers would find themselves being stuck with items that were of little or no value, thus not worth the money they spent.

The “cedok-cedok” sales were particularly common and popular among merchants on video-sharing platform TikTok where vendors would randomly scoop goods from an assortment of random items like candies, trinkets and cosmetics and sell them to customers at various prices depending on how much the items were scooped.

The Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry (KPDNHEP) has raised concerns over the trend, stating that customers have the right to know precisely what they were paying for and what they will be getting.

Besides that, Federation of Malaysian Consumer Affairs (Fomca) deputy president Mohd Yusof Abdul Rahman said in sale and purchase transactions, the goods sold and their price should be specified.

He said the elements of fraud similar to the claw machine could occur through the sale trend.

Meanwhile, National Consumer Complaint Centre (NCCC) senior manager Baskaran Sithamparam said he believed that consumers would be vulnerable to manipulation by unscrupulous merchants if they participated in the trend.

He added that consumers may not know if the items were safe for consumption or even for external use, as the expiry dates were unknown and the items sold may not be certified by the regulatory bodies such as NRPA and Sirim, among others.

Baskaran also shared that the NCCC did received queries on return and refund mechanism if the items sent were not the same or items have expired or damaged.

“Unless measures are taken to address these issues, consumers will be placed in a blind spot,” he said.

Besides the elements of fraud, another issue arising from the practice was the uncertainty of the value of the goods, ambiguous descriptions and lack of clarity on the product quality, which were against the Islamic law.

From the Islamic prespective, the “cedok-cedok” trend is haram (forbidden), as it contained elements prohibited under the Islamic law.

The Federal Territories Mufti office said the trend contained elements such as gharar (uncertainty), maisir (gambling) and denying the buyer’s rights of khiyar (choosing).

If the current trend was set to maintain, it suggested that retailers meet consumers halfway by stating the minimum amount of goods that the buyer will receive.

However, religious authorities recommended members of the public to refrain from engaging in such transactions and that sellers employ strategies which did not involve anything that was forbidden by the Islamic law to ensure that any profits made were halal.

According to the guidelines set under the Content Code 2022 by Content Forum and the best practices governing content in the electronic medium in the country, content that contained false or incomplete information and likely to mislead people, must be avoided.

The Content Code also dictates that advertising content shall not cause the consumer to be misled by any inaccuracy, ambiguity, exaggeration, falsehood, omission or otherwise.

Content Forum’s executive director Mediha Mahmood said all social media platforms including TikTok, has Community Guidelines that were implemented and enforced.

TikTok’s Community Guidelines, she said does not permit anyone to exploit their platform to take advantage of the trust of users and bring about financial or personal harm.

As such, she urged consumers to make informed purchases, and avoid playing into marketing gimmicks that lacked transparency in their sales, especially given the growing popularity of social media platforms being used by businesses.

She encouraged consumers to report to the TikTok administrator via the reporting functions available, if they detected vendors using unscrupulous means to cheat or mislead customers.