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Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

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Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#291

Post by thaumasiotes »

noduerme wrote: post #200
maxbond wrote: post #161

Why do payment processors do stuff like this? Is there some regulation that requires them to? I get that they don't want to process fraudulent transactions, but I'd think the response to a higher percentage of fraud from some industry would be to charge them more. It doesn't make sense to me why they would be concerned about the content of games, as long as everything is legal and the parties concerned aren't subject…

My guess is it's simply a chargeback risk. It's the reason casinos and adult sites have trouble getting credit card processing and are charged much higher basic rates, even under the best of circumstances when the casino or adult site is operating entirely within the law in the jurisdictions it allows. Punters run a lot of chargebacks on casinos, and people whose spouses catch a XXX video or game on their card statem…

Often it's because of secret government requirements.

Compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Choke_Point .

Somehow, it's forbidden for the government to oppress pornographers directly, but it's perfectly fine to impose legal sanctions on banks who maintain business relationships with them.

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#292

Post by lxgr »

terminalshort wrote: post #286
mapt wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Targeting them with what? What could possibly hold enough leverage that Visa would jeopardize their sweet gig as an ideology-neutral, essential piece of American infrastructure siphoning 1-2% off of every dollar of consumer spending?

The leverage is that the activists will potentially be able to draw the ire of the government. Visa and MC get away with absolute murder in terms of the size of the fees that they charge in the US. Most developed countries don't allow that. The US government could easily regulate them (as they already do with debit card fees) or use anti-trust law against the obvious duopoly charging exorbitant prices. Because of thi…

The Durbin amendment (regulating debit interchange in the US) and its EU equivalent aren't regulating Visa and Mastercard scheme fees, but rather interchange fees, which Visa and Mastercard set, but issuing banks earn.

Of course scheme fees are ultimately at least partially paid from interchange, but lower interchange is primarily a problem for issuing banks, not the networks.

The Durbin amendment in particular was also supposed to foster competition between networks (by mandating each debit issuer to support at least two unaffiliated networks per card), but given that only very few places accept only debit cards, that didn't work out quite as well as intended in terms of bringing down both interchange and scheme fees via market forces.

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#293

Post by deadbabe »

Aeolun wrote: post #282

I think it’s hilarious we allow stuff like Postal or Soldier of Fortune without a question, where the whole focus is on going crazy and murdering a whole bunch of people. But try to show a sensual human body, instead of one that’s ripped into small pieces, and oh my god, this is going too far!

I think this is a bit of a strawman. The market for people who get addicted to gruesome gore and are willing to pay money to see it is several orders of magnitude smaller than people willing to pay to see porn or OnlyFans. There is simply far more risk with adult content as a result and a lot more chargebacks from disatisfied customers with a post nut clarity.

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#294

Post by fragmede »

ls612 wrote: post #166
maxbond wrote: post #161

Why do payment processors do stuff like this? Is there some regulation that requires them to? I get that they don't want to process fraudulent transactions, but I'd think the response to a higher percentage of fraud from some industry would be to charge them more. It doesn't make sense to me why they would be concerned about the content of games, as long as everything is legal and the parties concerned aren't subject…

This is one of the ways the government can censor people despite the first amendment. It’s absolutely by design. The regulators “express concern” about certain financial activity and then the companies remove it.

this is such small potatoes compared to the results of everything going on right now though

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#295

Post by jjeaff »

SJC_Hacker wrote: post #241
miiiiiike wrote: post #191

Look. Ignore the content. Why the fuck do we allow credit card companies have a say in how we spend our money? Fraud? Abuse? Fine, let me put cash onto a card and if that card gets stolen, oh well, my loss. Mastercard should have no say in what what speech is considered acceptable outside of their offices. We don't care what execs at a water company think? Why do we care about the people at Mastercard?

Because they are on the hook for fraudulent transactions, until they get to merchant to refund. Otherwise they wouldn't care. Which is why some merchants get effectively blacklisted if they have too many fraudulent transactions

that wouldn't apply in this case, because the vendor, Valve, would be on the hook for fraudulent purchases and they would definitely have the deep pockets to pay out. The cc companies only have to worry about the small, fly by night companies that might disappear after a bunch of fraud.

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#296

Post by supertrope »

chao- wrote: post #280
guidedlight wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another factor is that credit providers (i.e. banks) are increasingly using customer transaction data to assess customer behaviour as part of its risk scoring. If a customer is regularly purchasing adult material that would be definitely be a red flag.

A red flag of what?

Defaulting on their credit card bill. Or the account ends up having been started by an identity fraudster. Which also ends in default.

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#299

Post by edoceo »

deadbabe wrote: post #293
Aeolun wrote: post #282

I think it’s hilarious we allow stuff like Postal or Soldier of Fortune without a question, where the whole focus is on going crazy and murdering a whole bunch of people. But try to show a sensual human body, instead of one that’s ripped into small pieces, and oh my god, this is going too far!

I think this is a bit of a strawman. The market for people who get addicted to gruesome gore and are willing to pay money to see it is several orders of magnitude smaller than people willing to pay to see porn or OnlyFans. There is simply far more risk with adult content as a result and a lot more chargebacks from disatisfied customers with a post nut clarity.

Are you saying porn buyers regret and that gore buyers do not? (As a broad generalization). Are you also asserting that's built in to risk-profole that payment gateways have?

Re: Valve confirms credit card companies pressured it to delist certain adult games

#300

Post by lxgr »

SJC_Hacker wrote: post #241
miiiiiike wrote: post #191

Look. Ignore the content. Why the fuck do we allow credit card companies have a say in how we spend our money? Fraud? Abuse? Fine, let me put cash onto a card and if that card gets stolen, oh well, my loss. Mastercard should have no say in what what speech is considered acceptable outside of their offices. We don't care what execs at a water company think? Why do we care about the people at Mastercard?

Because they are on the hook for fraudulent transactions, until they get to merchant to refund. Otherwise they wouldn't care. Which is why some merchants get effectively blacklisted if they have too many fraudulent transactions

The card networks are never on the hook for fraudulent transactions (nor for any other type of chargeback for that matter). If anything, it's the merchant's payment service provider/card acquirer that absorbs the loss if the merchant can't pay.
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