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People Are Using Venmo To Spy On Cheating Spouses (marketwatch.com) 102

Posted by BeauHD from the public-by-default dept.
According to MarketWatch's Leslie Albrecht, people are using the peer-to-peer payment app Venmo to find out if their spouse is cheating. Some are even saying the app is more effective than Facebook at this sort of investigation. "What you're seeing on Instagram or Facebook is what they want you to see," said Abby Faber, a 19-year-old freshman at Indiana University. "They're edited pictures that they put up. But with Venmo, it's very normal casual interactions. It's what they were doing and spending money on." From the report: Some users seem to forget that their transactions are public by default, and their payment activity provides an unfiltered paper trail of what's really happening in their lives. In [Faber's] case, she checked up on her ex-boyfriend and saw he was spending money on pizza and the popular video game Fortnite -- and making regular payments to one girl, who Faber guessed is his new hook-up.

Venmo has had a social component since it launched in 2009. Users see a feed of both their own friends' payments and total strangers' activity every time they open the app, and it's easy to look up users. Exact amounts aren't listed, but you can see who's paying who and which words or emoji they use to describe the payment. The social feed is Venmo's "secret sauce," said Erin Mackey, a spokeswoman for Venmo and its parent company PayPal. In fact, it's usually the reason people are logging on. "Our most active users check Venmo daily and the average user checks Venmo two to three times per week -- and it's not for payments, but to see what their friends and family are doing." The report mentions a settlement Venmo reached with the FTC last year over its public-by-default social component. The FTC accused (PDF) Venmo of "misleading" users about the fact that they needed to change two separate privacy settings to make their transactions completely private. "Venmo reached a settlement with the FTC, and a company spokesperson noted that users now have three options for controlling who can see their payments," reports MarketWatch.
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People Are Using Venmo To Spy On Cheating Spouses More

People Are Using Venmo To Spy On Cheating Spouses

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  • Uh, that's a hooker (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Notabadguy ( 961343 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @05:29PM (#56696014)

    "In [Faber's] case, she checked up on her ex-boyfriend and saw he was spending money on pizza and the popular video game Fortnite -- and making regular payments to one girl, who Faber guessed is his new hook-up. "

    That's a hooker.

    • Re: Uh, that's a hooker (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      As long as sheâ(TM)s not a stalker like the first girl.

    • Re:Uh, that's a hooker (Score:4, Funny)

      by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @08:57PM (#56696750)
      As the old saying goes, you don't pay a hooker for sex, you pay her to leave.

    • Re:Uh, that's a hooker (Score:4, Insightful)

      by scottrocket ( 1065416 ) on Wednesday May 30, 2018 @12:42AM (#56697368) Journal
      What drew my attention was ..."she checked up on her ex-boyfriend." Ha.

  • Why in the hell.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thomn8r ( 635504 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @05:31PM (#56696026)
    ...would someone use a payment system that tells everyone else what they're spending money on? Is the Snowflake Generation so narcissistic that they can't keep anything private?

    • Re:Why in the hell.. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by sqorbit ( 3387991 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @05:43PM (#56696078)
      That was exactly my thought. How self absorbed do you have to be to want to "socialize" your spending habits?

    • Re:Why in the hell.. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tlhIngan ( 30335 ) <slashdot&worf,net> on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @06:02PM (#56696162)

      ...would someone use a payment system that tells everyone else what they're spending money on? Is the Snowflake Generation so narcissistic that they can't keep anything private?

      Exactly. It's the braggart payment system.

      It's all about the brag - you brag about your vacation on social media, about the new phone you bought, your new clothes, etc.

      Venmo sumply capitalizes on that - hey, how you can PROVE you bought those items and not merely borrowed them!. Look at me buying my new phone!

      And yes, it's a thing - turns out a lot of people beg/borrow/steal items for their selfies. Like they may take a nice selfie in a fancy car, but it turns out it's owned by a family friend instead. There was one YouTube personality whose mom filmed her daughter using the mom's boss's fancy sports car saying how rich she was. As mom was a realtor, there was plenty of filming to be hand in client houses, too.

      It was only news because the mom got fired after she got found out. She now managers her daughter. But you can bet Venmo will be used heavily to prove those items were bought and not borrowed.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        It's all about the brag - you brag about your vacation on social media, about the new phone you bought, your new clothes, etc.

        Except that:

        - You can only pay other people, it's not accepted by most businesses and Apple certainly won't take it as payment for an iPhone

        - The transaction amount is not public, so as far as anyone else knows you might have sent $0.01 to that person

        It's still exceptionally stupid but as a bragging tool falls short.

    • I had never heard of this app and can think of few things more ridiculous!
       

      • I had never heard of this app and can think of few things more ridiculous!

        Same here. Is this a paid ad? The concept sounds ridiculous, I'm not sure why anyone would bother...

    • I've heard of Venmo but actually assumed it was one of those "next gen" web business ideas that would crash and burn. Didn't even realize it was still a "thing".

      It truly is one of the most STUPID, INANE ideas I can fathom that you'd want to tie in your payments for services or things to some kind of social network. Here we are, fighting for privacy in the era of security breaches everywhere, where people are stealing your personal information -- and yet we have these services that enable sharing the same ki

    • Not me, I used VenMo for the convenience.

      I thought I was sharing everything privately, but after reading the summary, I am not so sure anymore since I only saw one setting for setting privacy, not two.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by drolli ( 522659 )

      I am getting old too, and don't get it, too. Why on earth would I want to see my friends payments???

      Probably there is a selfie function which takes a photo, right when you press the "pay" button, to show how happy you are when spending money.

  • Huh? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Some users seem to forget that their transactions are public by default, and their payment activity provides an unfiltered paper trail of what's really happening in their lives.

    What ... the ... actual ... goddamned ... fuck????

    I had to Google, but this is a PayPal app, which makes your fucking transactions public by default?

    Jesus mother fucking Christ almighty ... so, PayPal are assholes and people are idiots?

    Why the fuck would you be using a payment app which makes your transactions public by default?

    Fucki

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • The internet is such a venom that Ruby Roundhouse is allergic to it.

    • peer to peer with emojis (Score:5, Insightful)

      by labnet ( 457441 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @05:55PM (#56696134)

      It seems venmo is a peer to peer payment app that also lets you leave social media comments.
      In fact the platform started as a text messaging service. Its seeing huge growth with Millennials to 'settle up' with each other. Think, your drinks tab, sharing a cab, selling a game.

      I think us lower UIDs, who have a solid memory of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, remember that spying was the key to rounding up millions of 'non conformists' for imprisonment or extermination. Young people don't have this historic memory of how psychopaths in power can misuse this information.

      Statistically the world is becoming more peaceful and perhaps us oldies are just paranoid: time will tell!

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Skidge ( 316075 )

        Solid memory of Hitler? How old do you think us lower UIDs are? (He died 73 years ago.) Young people should have had relatively the same history education vis-a-vis Hitler, Stalin, and Mao as us old folks. Hitler, Stalin, and Mao are more of the generation of my grandparents, and I have a lower UID than you and joined slashdot as an adult.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Cederic ( 9623 )

          Yeah, of those three only Mao was alive when I was born and he didn't stick around for long afterwards.

          I have a solid memory of the Stasi, how they operated, the vicious society they caused.

          I now spend time and money trying to stop my own government becoming them. The latest generation are seriously not fucking helping.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Bongo ( 13261 )

        Well, Eastern Europe, the Berlin Wall, and the threat of nuclear war. Fatalism and cynicism.

      • I think us lower UIDs, who have a solid memory of Hitler, Stalin, Mao, remember that spying w

        WHOAH, whoah, hold up a second there dude.... all I have a solid memory of is a Beowulf cluster of hot grits, served up by a petrified Natalie Portman!

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Because it was the first to make direct debits in the USA work like they do in the developed world.

      You plug in your credit card (Venmo charges 3%) or bank accounts (no charge) and then you can use Venmo to easily send money to the people around you and can transfer received money to your bank accounts or credit cards with the tap of a button.

      It's very handy for social situations like when you go out to lunch or dinner with a group - someone can pay the whole bill on their credit card and then you can easily

      • Because it was the first to make direct debits in the USA work like they do in the developed world.

        I didn't realize they had been around that long. How are they so far behind Paypal then if Paypal came after them? Paypal is everywhere- I've never heard of Venmo before today.

    • I think it's because the world is full of narcissists hunting for new ways to say "look at me!"

  • That can also be tracked, but not by your spouse.

  • Not my own. But I'm looking for prospects.

  • Whew. (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I had a customer wanting to pay me using Venmo for drugs. Jesus christ I'm glad I've never been into digital payments. Cash, bitches.

  • Holy Cow (Score:3)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Tuesday May 29, 2018 @08:33PM (#56696682)

    I already avoided Venmo because its security was apparently designed by cocaine-addled autistic toddlers... but TRANSACTIONS are PUBLIC by DEFAULT?!

    Perhaps I’ve been overestimating their security staff, all this time.

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