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PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

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Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#161

Post by Nyra »

_Microft wrote: post #144
imnotjames wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PayPal gets a list of banned strings from the Office of Foreign Asset controls. If any match those strings it's flagged for a review. This is more or less legally required for any company that moves money in the United States of America. You will probably find the same issues with the same terms on any other banking for financial body. Technically, these aren't being blocked. They're being audited. The payments will…

And the strings from this list have to be matched indiscriminately against everything? Names of account holders, text in the reference field of a transaction (if such a thing exists in the US), whatever?

Yep. I bought a used copy of Yakuza 0 online once and foolishly included the name of the game in the notes of the transaction. PayPal blocked the transfer of funds for over a week.

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#162

Post by refurb »

scarface74 wrote: post #136
Silhouette wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Politicians often ask for silly things in connection with technologies they don't really understand, to achieve goals they don't really expect to achieve, just in order to look good to a certain part of the electorate. Consider an analogy between modern social media sites and something like a phone network or postal mail service. What would happen if a politician suggested that phone companies or their national posta…

Yet posters on HN are the first ones to want the government to regulate tech.

It’s funny to see.

“Snowden showed how corrupt the gov’t is and how our privacy is at risk!”

“We should have the gov’t regulate communication on the big social networks!”

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#163

Post by salawat »

ineedasername wrote: post #119
wyattpeak wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not comparing like with like there. If you share a name with a suspicious group, yes, that's a hard problem to solve. That's not this. This is a _product_ with the same name as a suspicious group. It's categorically irrelevant.

No, aggressive filtering is the rational move here. The risks are highly asymmetric. A false positive gets you a frustrated customer that, as in this case, you can work with to modify the product description. Annoying. A false negative can get you a fi ne of $250,000 and criminal penalties. This isn't an issue of ( or not just an issue of) "not solving scale". Even if filtering issues if this sort were 99.9999% solve…

There is precious little "working" with PayPal. We had an unauthorized transfer of $1000 out of our bank account by PayPal, and they have a completely useless circular IVR, their chat bot is nigh non-functional, and their support documentation is woefully out of date. We ended up detecting the odd activity early enough to redirect the funds before someone (who added an unknown number to the account) did anything with it, but we started a dispute and chargeback just-in-case. Further business being cut off be damned.

I've worked in fintech/self-banking institutions. PayPal is a mockery of the entire industry. The example of the literal worst implementation anyone can think of and which leaves everyone scratching their head at how they manage to get away with running as fast and loose as they do.

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#164

Post by Marsymars »

floatingatoll wrote: post #157
imnotjames wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PayPal gets a list of banned strings from the Office of Foreign Asset controls. If any match those strings it's flagged for a review. This is more or less legally required for any company that moves money in the United States of America. You will probably find the same issues with the same terms on any other banking for financial body. Technically, these aren't being blocked. They're being audited. The payments will…

I hope an arms dealer names themself eBay Arms. I’m against arms dealers and PayPal and this would destroy PayPal.

FYI Paypal's been spun off from eBay since 2015 and its agreement to serve as eBay's default payment processor was set to expire this year.

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#165

Post by scarface74 »

refurb wrote: post #162
scarface74 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet posters on HN are the first ones to want the government to regulate tech.

It’s funny to see. “Snowden showed how corrupt the gov’t is and how our privacy is at risk!” “We should have the gov’t regulate communication on the big social networks!”

I think the last good thing that the government ever did with regards to tech in the US is cell phone number portability.

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#166

Post by floatingatoll »

Marsymars wrote: post #164
floatingatoll wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope an arms dealer names themself eBay Arms. I’m against arms dealers and PayPal and this would destroy PayPal.

FYI Paypal's been spun off from eBay since 2015 and its agreement to serve as eBay's default payment processor was set to expire this year.

Really! That is extremely interesting news. I’ll let the sentiment stand, but if you find an HN post about that or submit one, please link it here.

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#167

Post by wtracy »

b112 wrote: post #120
_heimdall wrote: post #82

I had a horrible experience with PayPal earlier this year. I needed to send $500 to an individual buying our house, they were paying cash and on such a tight timeline for closing that the closing docs were written up before they got back their inspection report and asked for an allowance. Paypal kept blocking the transaction even though it was just a simple person to person transfer. I was on chat with their support…

NO security team?! So they literally admitted that they don't have anyone actively monitoring transactions? Working to watch for fraud? Theft? Hacking? Wow, I may stop using them as well.

They have a whole department called "risk management" that is responsible for combatting fraud. (I worked for PayPal under that department in a past life.)

I'm sure there's a "security team" somewhere that responds to attempts to directly breach PayPal's infrastructure, though I never interacted with them. (Paypal has quite a bit of on-campus physical security, and I did interact with them almost every week.)

Circling back to the discussion at hand: PayPal probably doesn't have any digital/financial security staff at their call centers (why would they?) so as far as the call center reps are concerned, there is no "security team".

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#168

Post by LordAtlas »

adrr wrote: post #59
pieno wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well completing Know Your Customer checks and audits is sort of their job, isn’t it? They provide a service, saying that they will process payments unless the payment is prohibited by government sanctions. But instead of carrying out actual due diligence, they just block anything remotely related and put the onus and cost of doing their own job on their customers. At least they should have a better process to start p…

Yes they would, the fines are up to 250,000 per incident. If you share a name with someone on the AML list, good luck opening up a financial account anywhere and if you do manage to get an account, being able to fund the account from another source.

Is there any way to access this list so I don't end up naming any product, service or company with something on there?

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#169

Post by Ancapistani »

_Microft wrote: post #144
imnotjames wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PayPal gets a list of banned strings from the Office of Foreign Asset controls. If any match those strings it's flagged for a review. This is more or less legally required for any company that moves money in the United States of America. You will probably find the same issues with the same terms on any other banking for financial body. Technically, these aren't being blocked. They're being audited. The payments will…

And the strings from this list have to be matched indiscriminately against everything? Names of account holders, text in the reference field of a transaction (if such a thing exists in the US), whatever?

I’ve had an order of “Aleppo pepper” blocked from a small online retailer because it contained the word “Aleppo”.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleppo_pepper

Re: PayPal is currently blocking all transactions containing the word “tardigrade”

#170

Post by CleanItUpJanny »

rosstex wrote: post #145
awinter-py wrote: post #132

'this is an arbitrary + stupid mistake by a company known for drawing lines in the sand over stupid rules' is the less scary answer here we know tardigrades can travel through space. what if the aliens are already here tardigrades founded paypal to demoralize us with arbitrary + stupid rules, and their only weakness is the streisand effect

The only thing that would improve this comment is an embedded image of a tardigrade. Mods?

an upvote to you my good sir
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