What's wrong with 58? Now deeply embroiled in the resume resale controversy, it used to be the first group to go to the United States for "classified information" | business | information

Recently, it was reported that 58 Group collected student resumes under the guise of recruitment and sold them at a high price to training institutions, from which 58 Group received commission rebates. According to this matter, the reporter from First Financial called the official phone number of 58 Group and was advised to go to the 58 Group's hotline for reporting illegal and misconduct for consultation. After the call, the official client stated that the relevant content has been recorded and feedback will be provided within three working days. There is no immediate response regarding the security of the applicant's resume.

As of the time of publication, the marketing department of 58 Group has not yet responded to the news. Established on December 12, 2005, 58.com is positioned as a local community and provides free classification information services. In 2013, 58.com went public, acquired its competitor Ganji.com in 2015, and in September 2020, 58.com was privatized and delisted from the US stock market.

Although there was no positive response to the sale of student resumes, Yao Jinbo, Chairman and CEO of 58 Group, stated in a previous internal letter: "We believe that if our trading and industrialization business can succeed, it will definitely benefit our traditional business, the first curve, and make our traditional business better in terms of reputation, information quality, scenarios, and closed-loop."

But in the industry's view, the first challenge that 58 currently needs to face is how to solve the problem of false information.

The problem of false information is becoming increasingly serious

Since its establishment, there has been a continuous outbreak of false information in 58.com. According to the Black Cat Complaint Platform, as of the time of publication, there have been 18448 complaints related to 58.com, most of which are related to false information.

A user complained that after seeing the recruitment information on platform 58 and going to Hohhot, they found that the position did not match the description, but the 300 yuan registration fee already charged was not refunded; A user claimed that their registered mobile phone number was leaked while searching for a job on 58.com, and that the job attributes introduced to him by the other party required multiple loans; Another user found the other party through a 58.com rental advertisement and was charged a fee of 390 yuan, but no one provided them with a housing introduction service.

An even worse case of false information is undoubtedly the 2022 Cambodian "blood slave" incident: a man from Jiangsu, China was coerced into illegally immigrating to Cambodia due to his reliance on 58.com's local job advertisement, and was kept in captivity as a "blood slave". On the evening of February 16, 2022, the Chinese Embassy in Cambodia issued a statement regarding this case, stating that the police in Sihanouk Province of Cambodia have officially filed a case, and the police of China and Cambodia are collaborating to carry out relevant investigation work, striving to solve the case as soon as possible. On the morning of the 17th, a customer service representative from 58.com responded, "We will fully cooperate and assist the relevant departments in the investigation."

According to the judicial analysis of Tianyancha, 27.3% of the cases involving 58 historical cases in the same city were related to the infringement of the right of works information network dissemination, 9.0% of the cases were related to the China National Intellectual Property Administration, 66.3% of the cases were defendants, 26.9% of the cases were plaintiffs, and 66.9% of the cases were civil cases. At present, there are 548 cases in the stage of civil first instance, and 72.2% of the cases are located in Beijing.

In addition, 58.com has been interviewed by the government multiple times. According to information from Tianyancha, in September 2018, the Beijing Municipal Commission of Housing and Urban Rural Development and the Cyberspace Administration interviewed 58.com Group. Due to its failure to effectively fulfill its platform regulatory responsibilities, there has been a large amount of serious illegal and irregular housing information on the platform, such as selling "small property rights houses" and renting "group rental houses", as well as "black intermediaries" engaged in real estate brokerage business. They were ordered to suspend the publication of housing information in a certain area.

Zhang Xiaorong, Dean of the Deep Research Institute, stated that there are two major vulnerabilities in 58.com: first, there are security technology vulnerabilities, as a large number of user resumes have been leaked before; The second issue is the existence of content security vulnerabilities and a lack of supervision of information quality, which has led to many people being deceived in recent years. 58.com emphasizes the importance of information review and qualification review to the public, but false information still cannot be effectively controlled. Information review is not strict, the platform's information release threshold is too low, and the punishment for non compliant users is not strict.

In 2018, Yao Jinbo stated at a group press conference, "The biggest criticism from the outside world about 58 is false information and the authenticity of the information. I am a relatively idealistic person, and every time I see this kind of questioning, I feel very uncomfortable."

"We have access to more and more data, including user complaints, government backend departments, and cybersecurity data. Our voice in an industry is also increasing, and our constraints on the industry are also increasing. People are beginning to pay attention to the trust of 58.com, Anjuke, and the entire group." By continuously improving the product service chain and guarantee system, we provide comprehensive protection for customers and users. "Yao Jinbo said.

Downward data behind delisting

In recent years, life in 58.com has not been easy.

At the 2019 internal annual meeting, Yao Jinbo, Chairman and CEO of 58 Group, stated that no layoffs, no salary reductions, no reduction or postponement of year-end bonuses would be allowed. "Companies that have not gone through cycles are not great companies, and their hardships will make us stronger."

But in the following years, there were continuous rumors of layoffs in 58.com. In May 2023, multiple 58.com employees posted on Maimai stating that 58.com is undergoing a wave of major layoffs, with a proportion of up to 30% to 50%, and compensation will be based on an N+1 model. The 58 official did not provide a public response to this news.

In the Internet era, 58 cities, as a domestic information classification platform, are listed in the US stock market, but they are sitting on huge traffic but miss the liquidity channel in the mobile Internet era.

The last financial report data before the delisting of 58.com showed that in the first quarter of 2020, the total revenue of 58.com was RMB 2.5603 billion, a decrease of 15.5% from the same period in 2019, which was RMB 3.0283 billion; The total number of paid business users is about 2.7 million, a decrease of 20.7% compared to the same period in 2019; The gross profit margin is 87.9%, compared to 90.2% in the same period of 2019; The operating loss was 55.8 million yuan, compared to 281.3 million yuan in the same period of 2019; The non GAAP operating income was RMB 144 million, a decrease of 69.0% from RMB 465.1 million in the same period of 2019.

Gu Junhui, a positioning expert, said that in the era of mobile Internet, the development dilemma faced by 58 cities has become increasingly prominent. Although delisting is helpless, it can win some time for enterprises to save themselves. "In the era of intense homogenization competition, staying on top of trends is the key to truly mastering inertia and success. If the category has no future, it needs to quickly change direction."

On July 19th, the state released the "Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Promoting the Development and Growth of Private Economy". Yao Jinbo stated that "the company will firmly follow the" Opinions "as a guide, focus on" living and working in peace and contentment ", anchor the direction of industrial transformation, and through digital empowerment, supply chain upgrading, and user experience improvement, while achieving sustainable and high-quality development of the enterprise itself, strive to promote industry efficiency improvement and industrial development upgrading, and help build an innovative development pattern.".

In an internal letter from all employees, Yao Jinbo stated that 58 Group aims to become the world's first classified information platform to complete industrial transformation. In 2023, for all businesses, profitability in the city dimension is the minimum requirement. If profitability cannot be achieved within the year, the company will definitely not retain it and cut it 100%. All businesses must achieve full caliber profitability as soon as possible.

However, Yao Jinbo did not mention how to balance the contradiction between profit objectives and business health, how to solve the long-standing problem of false information, and how to place employees when cutting off non-profit projects.