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Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

blog.coinbase.com

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Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#261

Post by grubles »

s73v3r wrote: post #186
mirimir wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ... so that we can enable a future where financial privacy is optional (versus today, where it is basically inescapable). This is a typo, right? Financial privacy today is basically impossible, not inescapable. Tracking is basically inescapable, unless one uses cash. And using cash is becoming virtually illegal.

"And using cash is becoming virtually illegal." No it is not. Not even close. Stop with the paranoid hyperbole.

I've tried to deposit cash into my brother's bank account (in LA) to which I was denied due to money laundering law and "Mexican cartels". It was only $200-$300. Perhaps they thought I was part of a cartel due to my freckled white skin.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#262

Post by steven2012 »

wdewind wrote: post #245
steven2012 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

KYC is a joke. If you have information external to KYC for fraud prevention, that's something altogether different from KYC. The KYC requirements themselves are a joke and provide nothing in terms of verifying identity.

I think I probably agree with your general point that the mandated KYC practices are not enough to protect you and your stakeholders in and of themselves. That being said, I think you'd be surprised how much fraud fails to get through basic KYC checks. (I did not downvote you fwiw).

I'm very familiar with KYC, and fraud, etc. There's more than enough fraud that passes KYC to bankrupt your company. It's the additional work that keeps most companies of significant size in business.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#263

Post by CyberDildonics »

adrianmacneil wrote: post #123
ewillbefull wrote: post #19

You can now use Bitcoin anywhere VISA is accepted, so long as coinbase doesn't close your account, ignore you and close all the tickets you open. Even if you painstakingly collect and compile sensitive documents for them to review, which was a gigantic waste of my time, thanks! I have for months encouraged everyone I know not to use coinbase and will continue to do so.

This might be a silly question, but did you use your Coinbase account to conduct any illegal transactions? The team there really cares about customer experience, so generally if they are ignoring you it's because your account has some connection to illegal/banned activity, which they can't disclose due to ridiculous financial laws.

'Some connection' has seemed to mean more than two hops away, coinbase has decided that a transaction was for 'illegal' activity (I guess they play judge dredd in their own sandbox).

I hope it isn't true, but by now I think I've seen a dozen or so closed account and no communication stories.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#264

Post by CyberDildonics »

mbesto wrote: post #240
ewillbefull wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They only appear to care about the customer experience when someone complains on social media, until then they have a history of being jerks to their users. They closed my account after I made a (relatively small) wire transfer after not using their service for a while. The year before I made much larger transfers that didn't seem to concern them. Suddenly I needed to provide them with lots of financial information.…

But....did you use your Coinbase account to conduct any illegal transactions? You didn't answer a very straight forward question.

What is an illegal transaction?

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#265

Post by yasth »

joshmn wrote: post #218
draven wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What alternative do you point them to ? (just curious)

Not OP, but I think it's time we have some open-source, single-click install for some web-based app for managing a wallet. If you're using bitcoin, I'm assuming you can click something to install to Heroku.

Something like that just screams "eventual compromise and massive tears" though. Especially since most click to deploy solutions go on to pull from a lot of different remote servers, widening the attack surface.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#266

Post by CyberDildonics »

jandrese wrote: post #257
joosters wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin addresses for darknet marketplaces are easily available - e.g. https://www.walletexplorer.com/ Perhaps Coinbase will turn you away if they see you depositing money on a drugs market?

It is ironic that Bitcoin is thought of as the criminals currency when it's one of the most trackable in the world.

It depends on how it is used. Any darknet that has addresses associated with it could be run a lot better.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#267

Post by samstave »

jandrese wrote: post #260
drcode wrote: post #39

Just a reminder to Bitcoin newbies: This card looks like an OK product (still open questions about how much coinbase is gaming the ask/bid spread) but just realize that this card does NOT use Bitcoin, it uses "Coinbase Bitcoin"[1] which is Bitcoin for which the coinbase company is managing your private key: You only truly own Bitcoins if you own the private key for the account (users of MtGox learn this the hard way…

Wait, you give them your private key? Doesn't that defeat the entire security model of Bitcoin? Once Coinbase is hacked all of your money will be gone. It seems crazy to me that you would give them the private key.

Well if everyone was smart, they should just store all keys into a public Github repo. At least then they would have a backup if they may be stolen!!

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#268

Post by driverdan »

jsprogrammer wrote: post #147
adrianmacneil wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This might be a silly question, but did you use your Coinbase account to conduct any illegal transactions? The team there really cares about customer experience, so generally if they are ignoring you it's because your account has some connection to illegal/banned activity, which they can't disclose due to ridiculous financial laws.

How would Coinbase know anything about your transactions? Shouldn't they just process the exchange of necessary payment information?

That's what they should do. Instead, they follow your coins in and out and if they don't like how you use them they freeze your account.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#269

Post by amyjess »

Symbiote wrote: post #235
IkmoIkmo wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well no you're not really using bitcoin, not even Coinbase bitcoin. At the end of the day the creditcard simply uses a normal credit card transaction, which is denominated in dollars and paid for by Coinbase, in dollars, to the merchant. All Coinbase does is 1) make sure you enough bitcoin to cover the transaction 2) sell your bitcoin to recoup the dollars they're paying on your behalf to the merchant None of this ha…

> creditcards are basically plastic sheets of text Looking again at the site, there's no chip on the card. I thought the USA had finally introduced these — did I misunderstand something? (All my cards have had chips for over 10 years.)

Slowly, one bank at a time.

When I legally changed my name last year, I got all new credit cards. Only two of my new cards have chips.

Earlier this year, one card expired, and the new card has a chip. A couple of months ago, one of my cards was compromised by identity theft, and the replacement they sent me has a chip. Both of those were still chipless after I changed my name, so it must've been a recent change.

Also, I applied for yet another card, and this one has a chip.

Re: Introducing the Shift Card: Use Bitcoin where Visa is accepted

#270

Post by anon1mous »

such_a_casual wrote: post #256
tw04 wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can buy drugs with legitimate income. The fact he didn't directly say no the first or second time says the answer is probably yes.

>The fact he didn't directly say no the first or second time says the answer is probably yes. Your statement is perhaps true from the perspective of a 110 IQ individual. However, for the rest of us, it makes no sense to make such a silly assumption.

> on YN with 120+ IQ :)
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