inDrive has identified that 90% of gig worker income in Mexico is consumed by immediate living expenses, creating a systemic liquidity crisis for platform workers. By launching inDrive Money, the company leverages platform activity data to provide decentralized credit to the unbanked, bypassing traditional banking barriers. This initiative, presented during the 2026 Digital Rights Week, aligns with Mexico’s legislative and diplomatic efforts to utilize technological convergence as a tool for financial inclusion and social justice.
Over 90% of the income generated by digital platform providers in Mexico, such as app-based taxi drivers, is directed toward daily expenses like groceries and rent payments. According to the mobility and urban services company inDrive, this high cost-of-living ratio leaves workers with low liquidity to face unexpected expenses. The company suggests that digital platforms have the potential to drive financial inclusion for tech users who have historically been neglected by the traditional banking sector.
During the Digital Rights Week 2026 at the Mexican Senate, inDrive positioned its financial services arm, inDrive Money, as a central solution to the economic precariousness facing Mexico’s platform workers. According to the ENDUTIH, internet usage is highest among the 18-to-24 demographic, with over 98 million users nationwide now connected via smartphones, creating a vast but financially underserved digital workforce.
A primary development highlighted during the sessions is the financial fragility of the gig economy. In Mexico, approximately 90% of income generated by digital platform providers is directed toward non-discretionary costs such as housing, food, and education. This high expense ratio often leaves workers without the liquidity to manage emergencies or invest in professional maintenance, excluding them from traditional banking systems.
To mitigate these barriers, inDrive Money provides personal loans directly through the mobile application. Unlike traditional banking institutions, the platform utilizes internal activity data rather than conventional credit histories or extensive paperwork to determine eligibility. This model aims to lower entry barriers for the unbanked, offering interest rates and terms tailored to the specific cash-flow patterns of the mobility sector. “We promote digital financial solutions designed for drivers who have traditionally remained outside the banking system. Through inDrive Money, service providers can access personal loans directly from the application without paperwork or prior credit history,” stated Rafael Garza, Country Manager, inDrive Mexico.
Mexico as a Test-Lab for inDrive Money
The company identified a significant gap in the banking sector in July 2024 when it launched inDrive Money in Mexico, a market characterized by gig workers who are frequently excluded from traditional financial institutions.
In an interview with MBN, Andries Smit, Chief Growth Business Officer, inDrive, explained that the initiative was designed to empower people by supporting human decision-making through technology. The results from the Mexican pilot have shown that 45% of drivers who have taken an initial loan have returned for subsequent financing. “One of the most innovative aspects of the program, pioneered in Mexico, is the option for drivers to repay loans through their earnings. They can repay in cash if they prefer, but many choose to drive back their loan as they continue working,” Smit explained.
The success of this model has enabled its expansion to Latin America. Beyond providing immediate liquidity for vehicle repairs or family needs, the program also helps drivers build a formal credit history. “When drivers repay their loans, we report this information to credit bureaus, helping them build credit histories and eventually access larger loans from banks. This is part of our broader goal to create more equitable access to financial opportunities,” Smit explained.
Digital Sovereignty and the 2026 Legislative Agenda
During the opening ceremony of the Digital Rights Week 2026, Senator Luis Donaldo Colosio, Chairman of the Digital Rights Commission, noted that while 83% of the population over age six used the internet in 2024, the 2025 State Digital Development Index confirms that Mexico continues to progress at uneven speeds. Closing this connectivity gap is framed not merely as a technical challenge but as a matter of social justice, as rural usage remains significantly lower than urban levels, he said. “Digital rights are not a luxury; they are a vital condition for democracy, equality, and human dignity within the virtual and digital ecosystem,” he added.
Legislative efforts in 2026 have shifted toward high-impact regulatory instruments, including the implementation of the Biometric Unique Population Registry Code (CURP) and new guidelines for associating mobile lines with identified users. These measures demand strict data protection and cybersecurity standards to maintain public trust. Senator Rolando Zapata, Chairman of the AI Commission, emphasized that the current priority is developing a framework that balances technological regulation with economic growth, ensuring that innovation does not deepen existing social inequalities.
The legislative focus on financial inclusion in the Senate coincides with Mexico’s diplomatic effort led by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE). Ulises Canchola, Special Envoy for Emerging Technologies, SRE, noted that Mexico is deploying a dual-axis strategy to navigate what he described as an axiological crisis in global multilateralism. This policy prioritizes a normative axis to influence international digital governance and an operational axis designed to insert Mexico into high-value global supply chains, specifically within the AI sector.
Central to this strategy is a domestic definition of emerging technologies as systems that are digitalized, accelerated, and convergent. This framework allows SRE to address complex issues such as algorithmic interpretability, which seeks to understand the underlying logic of AI results that often remain opaque to users and regulators. By defining these terms locally, Mexico aims to participate actively in global governance while ensuring that technological acceleration does not undermine the rule of law or democratic values.
According to Canchola, Mexico has a long-standing history of international leadership regarding the socio-economic impacts of technological change. In 2017, Mexico, through its permanent representation in the UN, successfully promoted the adoption of a resolution focusing on the impact of rapid technological development on the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Despite this early advocacy, the absence of a globally agreed-upon definition for emerging technologies remains a primary obstacle in establishing coherent international governance, leaving nations to navigate these shifts without a shared descriptive or regulatory framework. “The accelerated development is so vertiginous that even today we do not have the words to describe what we are experiencing,” Canchola stated, noting that defining these tools is a prerequisite for any normative strategy intended to manage the geopolitical impacts of digitalization and algorithmic convergence.
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