Mastercard, Visa To Help Target Ads 222
New submitter ThatsMyNick writes "The two largest credit-card networks, Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc., are pushing into a new business: using what they know about people's credit-card purchases for targeting them with ads online. 'A MasterCard document obtained by the Journal outlines some of the company's plans, which included linking Web users with purchases. According to document, the credit card provider said it believes "you are what you buy." ... Visa is planning a similar service, which would aggregate its customers' purchase history into segments, including location, to make ads more effective at appealing to people in a respective area.'"
Do not want (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm for small government and as much a libertarian as anyone here, but this is one of those times where the government needs to step in and put some regulation in place.
We need something similar to the do-not-call-list thingie they did a few years ago for telephone numbers, where you opt yourself in and you don't get hounded at home from telemarketers.
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If they had this, and signing up excluded you from using a large number of websites.. would you still sign up?
Not a snide comment but a serious question. In cases like this, you are effectively trading your privacy for access to content. If you decline to provide your private information, it would seem reasonable for them to deny you service. There is a good argument that much of the great content on the internet isn't plastered in ads... but there is still a lot of good ad-supported content out there.
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Of course I would call cell phone carriers defacto monopolies since there are only about 4 of them...funny how none of them allow tethering without a fee...
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If I don't sign up to get blocked, but do use an ad blocker in firefox ... so I know that they know that I know they know, which means I don't care?
If they have private information that they can't use against me, then are they doing anything bad?
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Not a snide comment but a serious question. In cases like this, you are effectively trading your privacy for access to content.
I say that advertising killed micropayments. Advertisements have effectively filled the market need for micropayments, except that unlike a robust micropayment system, advertising comes with all kinds of extra baggage as the ad networks try to extract more and more value out of their systems. If enough people could opt-out of the ad networks that would create new demand for micropayments and we might actually see some progress on that front.
At least a guy can hope.
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I don't know how well micropayments would really work.
I mean, it would work for larger known sites.. sure. It's the dozen sites you plough through while looking for something that are the issue.
I don't mind paying for good content (and I do..) .. but I don't want to be paying for every site I quickly glance at either. Demo content doesn't work because the demo can often by very un-representative of what you get if you pay.
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I don't want to be paying for every site I quickly glance at either.
You are now, you are just paying with your privacy instead of a tenth of a cent.
Re:Do not want (Score:4, Insightful)
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Here in Canada, it actually made the problem worse.. because they distributed the list rather indiscriminately to everyone "so they'd know who not to call"... including people who not only ignored it but used it as a calling list.
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It seems like this sort of thing should be easy to avoid. Attach criminal penalties. The caller gets 1 hour in jail per minute on such calls, his direct boss gets 1 day per minute and the CEO gets 1 week per minute. I bet that would sort it right out.
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So do laws. Lots of treaties could have this added.
I would think the ICC should take charge and consider it a violation of human rights :)
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for purchased mailing lists, they do tricks like this.
they will sell you one 'use' of the list. you can send to everyone there, once.
after that if you use it again, you have no idea who the fake one (or few) are and they are the test cases. if you hit those booby traps, the vendor knows you 'stole' an extra unpaid instance.
why not use that for the DNC? load it with 'triggers' and if the bastards call, throw them in the slammer! after taking ALL their assets (ie, treat them like drug criminals).
after a f
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sorry, but I do support OWS
Did you hear the entire Oakland police force just decended on OWSO and beat them into a pile of hippieburger? Happy days! OK, maybe there wasn't any violence, but somehow I doubt there'd be any riots over these beatdowns.
Do you also plan to overthrow the 1% of (people who fancy themselves) musicians who are good enough to make 99% of the money (that musicians make)? The 1% of the (people who fancy themselves) atheletes who make 99% of the money (that players make)? Sorry, but I do support the 1%.
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And then one would grow large enough to buy the others, and you'd be left with one or two behemoths controlling it all, doing what they can to maximize profits, and crushing or buying up start-ups.
Uh, no. That's what happens when you have regulations that prevent new competitors from entering a market by creating artificial barriers for new companies.
Big companies love regulation for that very reason; they can easily comply whereas small competitors can't. But useful idiots keep demanding that big goverment regulate big business and the big business keeps laughing all the way to the bank.
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Big companies love regulation that they create for that very reason
fixed that for you ;-)
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or they are out of business
Your proposal is acceptable.
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Sounds about right for the giant cockroach you are quoting.
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Which is why most of that regulation does not apply to small players. Whole reams of regulation go out the window for privately owned companies, even more for those with less than 100 employees.
Sorry if the truth conflicts with your world view.
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That is to say, fuck you. Regulation is there and real. If it weren't, there would be a ton of companies competing with each other.
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citation needed
Any links?
How did he plan on having a winery with no employees. Did he think grapes bottled themselves?
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But seriously, fuck you. Regulation is real, and places an uneven burden on new businesses. Try opening a business and see just how real it i
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How exactly do you buy things ONLINE?
Also, as far as I know...your children are not responsible or liable for your debts when you cr
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Indeed. I don't need the government making my decisions for me. If I don't like what Visa are doing, then I'll stop using them.
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And what are you going to do in Europe where AmEx is unusable except in airports and boutiques?
Building a world-spanning network is complex and expensive. And not because of monopolies but because it's HARD.
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If my personal privacy if important enough to me, then I won't willingly deal with a company that exposes it. If that's inconvenient for me, then so be it.
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In a lot of places (car rent, parkings, etc.) you simply can not pay cash. So the answer is: "make these companies respect your privacy".
A non-commercial global company would have been the best answer. But it's not going to happen, alas.
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Because AMEX and Discover will not. If this makes money for VISA they will do it too. You will thus be stuck with this intrusion or without the ability to buy.
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Either a niche will open for an ethical credit card, or enough people will boycott credit cards to a degree that cause retailers to have to offer an alternative form of payment for online purchases. No state intervention required. Just market forces.
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Or they will ignore the 0.5% of possible customers.
The option I provide is far more likely.
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Either a niche will open for an ethical credit card...
There is a huge barrier to entry here -- nobody is going to use a credit card that most merchants won't accept, and no merchant is going to bother accepting a card that nobody uses.
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This is what boycotts are for. If enough people refuse such services, then either the services will change or the merchants who use those services will change. The trick is to get enough mass appeal for the boycott.
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I would be thrilled if consumers actually got outraged and boycotted when companies treated them like shit, but they just seem to roll over and take it. To see why I am skeptical, look at the responses to my comment about GOG.com here [slashdot.org].
Advertising and money (Score:2)
How much is enough? The rich suck up money like vacuums, and the media inundate us with intrusive advertising.
Ever watch a YouTube video on Facebook with Chrome? Aren't you annoyed by that damned popup overlay banner at the bottom pushing even more Google advertising?
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If Google wants to get in my face with advertising, I'll do my level best to get in their face about Canadian privacy laws.
Affected by Intermediaries (Score:4, Interesting)
I would be curious to see what effect services like PayPal would have on the ability for credit card companies to sell your data to advertisers. Do they still receive the relevant data, or is that retained at PayPal's level?
Granted, there's also nothing to prevent PayPal from doing the same thing with the customer data it collects. Back to gold doubloons handled with gloves, I suppose...
It's called data analytics (Score:2)
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No. Because I don't use social networking sites, and I have adhosts blocked, and use an ad blocker. Hell the only reason why I have a credit card is because I don't feel like dealing with carrying a wad of cash when I'm on the road, and my canadian debit card doesn't work in the US. Well my credit card can be hit or miss too.
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I'm in exactly the same boat. This assistance they are so determined to extend in my direction can only jostle the elbow of merit-based purchasing decisions if I allow it to do so.
A meme I've dropped here in the past is how having a cable TV subscription is like parking a salty chip truck on your front lawn. One thing we know about human nature is that if you wish to prevail, you must win your battles in the store rather than at the refrigerator door where we quickly succumb to Decision Fatigue [nytimes.com].
Eventuall
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all that data will be used to compile an consumer profile on which companies will base their marketing and advertising. It's all very creepy and big brotherish.
What's worse is that it's extending beyond simply "marketing and advertising" - the personal data collectors are looking to extract value from all that personal information any way they can. "Targeted marketing" is just the first obvious idea that has occurred to them. The second obvious idea is to sell that data to governments [cnn.com] to circumvent constitutional protections against unreasonable searches. Some companies are selling location data, especially current location, to companies and individuals for tra
Well FUCK. (Score:5, Interesting)
make ads more effective at appealing to people in a respective area
Please, please no...I hate this place and the people in it with a passion, the last thing I want is to be bombarded with the bullshit they buy -.-
Before you move into a new neighborhood ... (Score:2)
... use Google to find out what the folks there buy with their credit cards. KKK hoods? Anti-vaccination literature? Cannibalism Club Dues? Schizophrenia self-help books? Crack house paraphernalia? See what they've got under their fingernails . . .
Real Estate Agent: "Oh, it's a nice neighborhood, with pleasant people!"
You: "And they seem to spend a lot of money on books about how to annoy and sue their neighbors. And which one bought the cat skinning machine?"
It could influence your choice of loca
What if I don't mind? (Score:3)
The /. assumption is its all gonna be hospital bills paid by Visa HIPPA violations and sex toy purchases. What if I don't really care about keeping a certain subset private, say "books" or "anything I bought at amazon.com"?
OK /. here is a list of stuff I purchased recently using a CC:
I ebayed a HP (made back when HP was "cool") WR-42 waveguide frequency meter for a ham radio 24 GHZ thing I'm working on (thats twenty four GHZ not two point four)
I bought a quantity of tapioca maltodextrin to experiment with edible oil sands (tastier than it sounds). With the idea of making a sandy italian salad, if that makes any sense. I know its hydrophillic, I guess I'll find out if its deliquescent soon enough...
Sitting on my desk unread is a Stephen Wolfram paperback of all his comp sci papers. Glance thru looks interesting. I enjoyed ANKOS. Hoping for a rainy, reading filled weekend filled with cellular automata. Or maybe next week, who knows.
Nature Publishing Group had an "impact" sale where you can subscribe for the impact number of the journal rather than the list price. No way in Fing hell I'm paying $299 or whatever it is for Nature Physics paper journal. But I'll subscribe for $18 or whatever it was exactly. I suppose just the gasoline to drive to the library every month will pay for this... I'm not sure how they're even keeping up with postage costs at $18.
Does anyone, myself, /., or the NSA, really care about any of this or find any actionable info in this?
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Nature Publishing Group had an "impact" sale where you can subscribe for the impact number of the journal rather than the list price. No way in Fing hell I'm paying $299 or whatever it is for Nature Physics paper journal. But I'll subscribe for $18 or whatever it was exactly. I suppose just the gasoline to drive to the library every month will pay for this... I'm not sure how they're even keeping up with postage costs at $18.
Does anyone, myself, /., or the NSA, really care about any of this or find any actionable info in this?
Subject referred to "Nature" (note capitalization), "impact" and "NSA" along with obfuscated profanity. Flag profile as potential eco-extremist and refer to appropriate agencies. Add to no-fly list pending further evaluation.
FWIW, I don't mind accurate information about me being collected and processed competently. On the other hand, I very much do mind what actually happens with this information.
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If you didn't commit any crimes then you won't mind if the police search your house, right? Since you don't cheat on your taxes then you won't mind if the IRS conducts an audit of the last 5 years of bank activity, right? Since you only made a bunch of generic yet strangely geeky purchases on your credit card, you won't mind if we share that information with advertisers, right?
What could possibly go wrong?
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sure until some asshole decides to broadcast advocacy for terrorism from his ham radio
Obviously you've never listened to the idiots on 75 meters and 20 meter sideband
all of a sudden fit the description of a domestic terrorist due to information being available that would otherwise have required warrants to collect
Ham radio licenses are public record.
http://wireless2.fcc.gov/UlsApp/UlsSearch/searchAmateur.jsp [fcc.gov]
Also http://www.qrz.com/ [qrz.com] and about a zillion other places.
Don't confuse government sharing, which is nearly total, and govt publicity which is also pretty wide open, with this new idea of advertiser sharing.
I've been expecting this for a while (Score:3)
I've been expecting this for some time. Google only knows what you look at. Visa and MasterCard know what you do. Amazon does this now, but only for sales within Amazon's system. Now it can work for everyone.
This could upset Google's dominance in online advertising. If some other search engine or social network partnered with Visa and MasterCard, they could do search ads much better than Google can.
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Master Card Opt Out (Score:2)
a telling choice in phrasing (Score:2)
They're viewing you as prey.
Anonymous (Score:2)
Your bank shouldn't give out your data to the card companies so theoretically they only know the ATM the transaction was made from, so they can change ads respectively in the area.
Good luck with that (Score:2)
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Personally they could post a list of all my visa purchases on a public website with my name right at the top and I wouldn't care.. but I can still understand why other people get upset about this kinda stuff.
Some people do have (perfectly legal) things they want to hide for whatever social or practical reasons.
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Actually, I partially agree with your sentiment. I worry more about privacy on the personal level and not on the corporate, world-spanning level. To clarify:
I don't give a rat's ass what Visa knows about me, and what Google collects about my searches and what info they get from it. Corporations want to spend millions of $$$ to harvest all my online activities and send me ads in my mail or on a site I visit? Let them have their fun. I don't give a damn. May they grow old and die chocking on their money, for
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You do know that the government can dragnet through corporate data easily enough w/o warrant or order, though, right? And that this aggregated, personalized data will be made available to other companies, like...oh...insurance companies. Your spending history will affect your rates with them, much like your credit history already can do...
One of these days, it will become a level of fraud for you to claim a non-smoker discount on your health insurance but the insurance company, through your spending data, d
time date & location (Score:3)
So... You're not home usually between X and Y. Bought a new TV, expensive computer, key hiding rock.
Information is power.
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Location and time information, yes, I would want to keep off such a public site for the kind of practical reasons you have highlighted.
The fact that I eat at a place called Marios on a fairly regular basis.. not too sensitive but if I had a stalker I might be concerned...
The fact that I buy stuff from newegg, tigerdirect, NCIX, dell (ok, that is somewhat embarassing..), mouser, have a subscription to jamplay, safari books, and have a vps with slicehost .. I have a hard time seeing this hurting me.
Either way
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If you pay ANY restaurant 3 times per week (total, not each), it can be pretty reliably determined that there is a 50% chance you won't be home between 5 and 6 on Friday night. That list of computer hardware stores? I guess you've got some good stuff at home!
Season hockey tickets almost *guarantee* you won't be home at certain time, night clubs have limited hours (and most people go on Fridays & Saturdays), bus/plane tickets are also a good indicator that the house is empty.
You'll will notice that not O
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Some people do have (perfectly legal) things they want to hide for whatever social or practical reasons.
Some of us have 'things we want to hide' (or what we would cause 'a desire for privacy') for no social or practical reason, and find it weird that anyone would think that needs a justification.
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I agree with this too.
I think people do have a right to privacy. The fact that I'm not overly concerned with privacy (at least not on spending habits) doesn't mean I don't recognize that people have the right to say "I don't want you to know that" if for absolutely no other reason than they don't want you to.
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Rather than hiding behind the fact that they probably won't do that, why don't you put your money log where your mouth is and post a history of all your credit card purchases in response to this post? Include times and locations.
I'm not trying to get in the middle of your specific spat or privacy terror, but isn't there an extremely practical problem now that MC and Visa can be used to pay medical bills, vs HIPPA and all that?
I'm sure they can figure out which billers to filter out, but it does bring up the point that its not just a tinfoil hat thing but a possible HIPPA legal violation.
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In addition, what does PCI have to say about this?
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Its a lot simpler to post a link to your blippy profile
There are people who volunteer for this. Financial equivalent of exhibitionism, or conspicuous consumption carried out to its logical conclusion.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blippy [wikipedia.org]
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Time and location I'd want to keep secret for largely practical reasons.
Specific restaurants I'd probably not care but I can see if someone was trying to avoid someone else how this may be an issue.
Other than that though, would be pretty damn boring. You'd find out I spend a lot on computer junk and play guitar .. I actually gave a short list later in this thread.
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Yet another reason to try to go more cash only....
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Except in Louisiana [slashdot.org]
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Is there anyone who has nothing to hide?
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You would have to start at nudist colony's. Most people hide themselves.
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yeah, next thing you'll tell me that *you* buried paul.
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No...but the walrus was Paul....
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If you have nothing to hide
Funny how that concept got left out of the Consitution or any of the debates, letters, or treatises that shaped it.
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Personally I think this applies to data about one's self but I do not know if the law agrees.
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Funny how this has absolutely nothing to do with the constitution. Or did it start applying to private companies recently?
The Constitution applies to private companies in a thousand and one ways.
How about you try doing this: Start a private business and hang up a sign that says "No Niggers Allowed"
See how long your idea that the Constitution doesn't apply to private companies will hold up against the 14th Amendment.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbMuEjASwzg [youtube.com]
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It's a good thing that everyone something to hide, isn't it?
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In an envelope to some online store?
Biggest thing keeping me tied to visa is online shopping..
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Can't you buy VISA/MASTERCARD gift cards with cash and use those? I guess they could get the name and address from the online store though.
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You have to "activate" those by providing your name and address in order to use them at said online stores, so doesn't do much good.
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Why not provide BS for that? Give them the address of a public park and the name of a famous actor.
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Unless you are planning on having it shipped to said famous actor at said park.. very few stores are going to send something to an address not matching the one on the card.
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Since when?
I buy all kinds of stuff on amazon and have it shipped directly to friends and family for their birthdays and holidays. I have never had any trouble. I have even done this with one time purchases at random websites for gifts before when amazon did not have the item.
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He should rephrase. Most stores make you specify the billing address for the card and this is checked with AVS. If that matches, you can specify a different shipping address if you want to.
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All the gift cards I've used require some sort of registration with a name. Okay, so I've only used two types of gift card and that's a terrible sample size.
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then prepaid visa, then.
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COD (charge on delivery)
This practice in America is mostly dead now though.
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the hell it is!
COD is one very effective way to deal with errant postmen. instead of dropping the box at your manager (apt buildings..) or neighbor or bushes, he MUST collect money for it.
in networking, we call that an ACK and it helps establish more reliability in the protocol.
works for postal guys, too ;)
even if you pay the bulk in check, still good to collect a dollar COD or some token amount so that it MUST be hand delivered.
neat trick, huh?. now, go enjoy your new postal balanced protocol exchange.
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Is this an option with amazon.com?
One drawback about it...generally (with me) there is no one home during the day when deliveries are made.
How do you get around that? Do you have a stay at home wife?
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Cash on delivery (COD) exists in Australia through Australia Post but I have always considered it prohibitively expensive. For example the current rate is $8.05 + postage to send the item, $11.30 + postage to return the payment to you, and $16.50 if the delivery cannot be made. It adds nearly $20 to the price of an item but does provide a small transit insurance. I have never heard of anybody using COD here.
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Yep this is only going to make me use credit cards even less, if that's even possible.
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I'd imagine that one good security breach could bring down the whole house of cards.
Well maybe your house of cards, theirs is still nicely safe.
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American Express in the US does have the "pay wave" thing, their term for it is Express Pay. I've never used it. You can contact Amex and have the feature disabled on your account so the transactions don't get approved, but the RFID chip is still present in the card so conceivably some bad guy can poll it for data.
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I use mine all the time, it works great. I am not liable for fraudulent charges so why do I care?
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I'm also glad whenever a store checks my ID or the signature on the back of my card (which they are specifically forbidden from doing in their contracts with visa/american express/master card/discover).
http://usa.visa.com/merchants/risk_management/card_present.html [visa.com]
"6. Check the signature. Be sure that the signature on the card matches the one on the sales draft. Do not accept an unsigned card."
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Go read actual contracts signed by actual merchants.
They all specifically preculde merchants from checking ID or the signature, even if the signature is blank.
How about you cite some evidence I can actually access? I don't know about checking the ID, but I don't believe for a minute that merchants aren't allowed to check the signature, which would be in direct contradiction to Visa published guidelines.
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Do you think they'll sell your information to third parties
Umm they have been doing that for decades...