Bitcoin Forum

Is bitcoin has consumer protection?

To my knowledge bitcoin has no consumer protection because there are many cases hack that makes consumers experiencing loss. Addition there is no government regulation in some countries also make there is no certainty of law on consumer protection. Consumer protection must have security and certainty of law, and it must be met to ensure bitcoin that users save.

Most governments barely acknowledge Bitcoin as it is quite a grey area between an asset and a currency.  Because of this, there is no consumer protection.  There are many factors of Bitcoin which make it ideal for scamming - one being that it's pseudonymous and therefore people can take Bitcoin payments with there being next to no trace of the scam for governments to see, unless they use the same address repeatedly which is unlikely (and governments are unlikely to want to take action, especially since they don't know a lot about Bitcoin and don't really want to get involved).

Also, Bitcoin itself is never going to take action because there is no specific company to do it unless you pay for some kind of insurance, which would most likely be a scam in itself.

When you use Bitcoin, you need to be careful and practice a bit of common sense: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. 

Luckily, in most cases when you get scammed it's only however much you send to the scammer that is taken for you.  They can never ruin your life because they won't figure out your personal information, so the pseudonymous nature of Bitcoin sort of helps the victim as well.

It is the ultimate in consumer protection. You and you alone control your bitcoin. Many people are confused about fiat currency and think they own their money. In fact a currency like US dollars are owned by the federal reserve. You may use them according to the rules created by the owner for purposes that they see fit. But they are not yours and you can't even legally destroy them.

Bitcoin is by far the cheapest, fastest, and most secure way to pay anyone anywhere. For me everything else is just a crappy frequent flier mile system.

Even from the evolution of time of bitcoin I dont think there is the assumption to have consumer protection because that will negate the concept of total freedom bitcoin seeks to achieve. Although, I admit this is a disadvantage because quite a number of people have been duped including myself and there is no one to report to. I guess for now we just have to be responsible for ourselves and be more careful as no one to protect any one in this crypto-world.

Ok thanks for suggest.

while there is no legislation on the protection of bitcoin, of course the handling of cases of theft of bitcoin will be difficult if submitted to a legal process, but I hope someday there rules about bitcoin and laws in various countries that will provide security for users bitcoin

Not really, however if you have gotten scammed a big amount by someone it is a good idea to file a lawsuit agains that person.

But if you are just purchasing something off the web which is like $10 and you get scammed, then i'm sorry, there is pretty much no way that you can have that money back. There is no "chargeback" feature with bitcoin.

This is what makes bitcoin successful and at the same time a favourite tool for the scammers.

Just make sure you always use a reputable site or with a reputable escrow, don't ever trade with newbies or anyone you don't know.

One of the most common problems that people mention about Bitcoin is the lack of consumer protection. All Bitcoin transactions are irrevocable and if you don’t get the product you purchased you have no recourse to get your money back. Some see this as a positive as Bitcoin avoids fees that are charged by credit card companies by not having an institution to intermediate chargebacks. Hopefully, before your purchase, you have formed a relationship with the merchant so you’re chances of fraud is low but these cases do happen and Bitcoin hasn’t been able to help those customer a lot.
Until now. Bitcoin has found a solution to its new age problem. Payments will now go through escrow and will only be released once it’s confirmed by the customer that they have received the product. This, however, is not just a straight forward escrow account, Bitcoin is doing a multisignature transaction. What does that mean? Instead of the customer sending money to an escrow agent, it gets sent to two of three multisignature addresses that are created using the public keys of the customer, the merchant and the escrow agent. So, basically, the funds from the customers address can only be spent when two of the three parties cooperate.
So it works like this –
Jack wants to send money to Jane through an escrow agent for an iPhone 6. Jack searches the website Bitrated choosing “Browse arbitrators” and finds an escrow agent named Jill. He clicks to start the transaction and includes what the transaction conditions are – for example, he says that for 1.5 BTC, Jane will send him an iPhone, unused and undamaged and he clicks to begin the process. Jack is provided with a link to send Jane and when Jane receives it, she opens up the link and accepts.
Bitrated then creates the three multisignature addresses between Jack, Jane and Jill (even though Jill has not participated yet, Jack has Jill’s public key so the address can be made). Jack sends the money and Jane will see through a confirmation that the money is in escrow. When Jack receives the phone and is ready to release the money, he just enters Jane’s address and how much should be released. Jane can see that money is pending and she can then click on the pending transaction to review it. Once she sees it’s the correct amount, she can approve it and the transaction is complete.
If there was a dispute over the transaction, either one of them could click a link on the page to contact Jane to mediate the dispute. She gathers information from both of them and then makes a decision based on the information who is right in the dispute and her decision settles the matter.
There are several advantages to this system. Most transactions will not need a mediator so there won’t be a fee that is incurred. If the mediator does get involved, there will probably be a fee but it is paid by the people using the service, it’s not spread out across all the users of the system. If Jack and Jill decided that Jane is doing a bad job, they can together decide to use a different mediator. And the mediator cannot take the money herself since she needs the signature of one of the other parties to do this.
The security of the multisignature system is well thought out as Bitrated does not keep any of the data on its own server. All the information of the escrow transactions are kept in the user’s URL. The only drawback is the fact that the escrow agents are unregulated so you’re really not sure how honest they are. It would help if Bitrated put in a system to vet the agents, especially for new users who are not familiar with the system.
Bitrated needs to make its next step to include e-commerce into this setup. As it stands, the service is only for person-to-person money transfers. Having a mediator available for online store transactions would give customers the confidence in their transaction and feel like they have someone to help them if the product they purchased does not arrive. If this system becomes a standard in the Bitcoin world, it could even transfer as a lower cost alternative for merchants using credit cards as they would never have to pay a fee as long as they delivered the products that were purchased.
Another area Bitcoin is improving in customer protection is allowing businesses to do a public audit of its assets which permits a business to prove the use of its Bitcoin assets without providing any private information about its customers. This allows customers to do their own research on companies that they will be dealing with.
Bitcoin is making strides to make its currency and its use more secure to encourage growth and confidence. In order to get rid of a lot of myths about Bitcoin and its uses, these changes will change the Bitcoin’s reputation and the world’s trust in its service.

Bitcoin is the perfect consumer protection. Just always use a reputable site while Bitcoin trading. Till now there are no laws about Bitcoin consumers but hope someday there are laws that will offer security for consumers. prior to you buy, you have shaped an association with the shipper if you have chances of fraud by this, fraud chances can be low yet these cases do happen and Bitcoin hasn't possessed the capacity to help those clients at a considerable measure.

All the rules on consumer protection apply only to legal assets. Bitcoin is not regulated by laws so there are no rules. We must ensure its protection. And rightly so. If the user of bitcoin believes himself to be free from obligations to the government all its functions it should assume.

Consumer protection is just only available or can be seen on centralized things which we wont ever see on Bitcoin itself. If a certain transaction have been done then it cant be revised no matter how the buyer didnt like on such transaction then he cant do nothing because all is irreversible and thats the beauty of bitcoin which i do really like and for most people.This is not like paypal or any other services that do need this protection.

I think BTC doesn't have consumer protection because in countries where it is banned by the government of that country. So there will be no responsibility of the government if you are cheated by someone.

Consumer protection is for something that is offering a product, bitcoin is not offering anything. What it offers is an alternative for your cash something that you can use with a faster transaction and without a particular entity that controls it but it is being confirmed by everyone who uses it. So having a consumer protection for bitcoin is impossible.

Consumer Protection is one major thing that bitcoin has not been able to provide due to some reasons. We know that there are no government rules and regulations on bitcoin which lead to misuse of the currency and hence hacking and frauds. Nowhere in the world, government takes responsibility of bitcoin and consumer protection regarding it.

Bitcoin is decentralized currency, no one control bitcoin except yourself , not your government !
At my country = my government still not legalize bitcoin so if I got scam because of bitcoin, I can't do anything because the police can't chase the thief (If you understand what I mean )

Agreed on this. Bitcoin is not regulated by the government, that's the case for countries that banned bitcoin. As for the countries where bitcoin is legal and doesn't sue you a criminal case for using it, still the government gives warning and precaution to it's users. The same thing with fiat money, it can be used for illegal trades that government is having hard time to stop.

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Is someone here has an idea if there are groups or organizations that are starting to give protection to us? Even local exchanges doesn't guarantee it.

Coinbase has a certain form of insurance policy, which only applies to certain circumstances where coin loss may occur, but that's obviously not from the user side. Everything people lose is their own responsibility.

I personally don't see much need for any service to offer a direct form of user protection like how PayPal offers its users buyers protection. I like how all transactions once confirmed are final.

That however doesn't mean that there won't be such a service somewhere in the future. People however must understand that it only works if you operate in a centralized environment, and that's something I want to avoid as much as possible.

Consumer protection are the governing laws in which the consumer are protected by possible scammers or unfair trades so since bitcoin has no law then there is no consumer protection. When it comes to bitcoin, you are on your own. You are not protected in case there are people who will scam you because there are no applicable laws. You just have to tighten security yourself by having strong passwords, 2FA, offline wallet, using escrow to prevent being hacked or scam. This is why many people are still doubtful about the cryptocurrency because they want to be secured in case there are some things that will happen unfavorable to them.

I haven't heard of bitcoin consumer protection ever ! Not even in the countries which have legalized bitcoin .
Governments don't even want to legalize bitcoin , so having a consumer protection is a far- off thing . Everyday a lot of cases of theft of the private keys comes to my knowledge but there is no particular investigation for this offense . This obviously is a offense in the eyes of the users but that is not recognized by the law .
Even if it recognized , getting any protection is very hard in case of bitcoin .                                                                       

is there any application that can protec ?

Since I'm not using coinbase, I didn't know that there is something like that about insurance policy. I did some research about that thing and maybe I was too lazy enough to read other reviews and it says that is very limited and not that much effective.

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It may be applicable for someone that has a business of goods and delivers it to his customers, he can make his own policy about consumer protection but he has to be fair for giving himself protection too. Well, I can't see this possible to bitcoin.

It seems to me that in order to protect bitcoins from theft you need to make a transit server. It tranzactii could be stored until the user confirmed that the transaction has committed it. This would increase the time of confirmation, but will protect users. I am sure that it is possible to develop other protection mechanisms.

Bitcoin will not have a consumer protection because it is not a product, it is a currency. Currency don't have consumer protection you have your government to protect you against fraud.

To have a protection like that you would need to use a centralized service that would guarantee you some advantages, but then Bitcoin wouldn't be decentralized anymore for you, you would need to follow any rules this service force you to do. And I think there isn't any service fully protecting the users right now. At some point I believe gonvernments will introduce this consumer protection when regulating Bitcoin on each respective country, but don't think it will be a good thing at all...

The biggest obstacle to Bitcoin 's failure to pay is the inability of the customer to protect it. The double spending and the inability to recover the operation are very damaging.

Banks are the ones that will give you consumer protection but bitcoin will not. Everything that will happen to your bitcoin is your own responsiblity and no one controls it so let me remind you again that it is decentralized at the first place.

Yes I agree with your opinion. Bitcoin is our own responsibility. The Bank will only provide protection to consumers rather than on bitcoin.

Let say if government already legalize bitcoin, it means that they have protect bitcoin usage but the other disadvantage is bitcoin is not consider as decentralized currency anymore as they also apply tax on them.

In other side ,it's prevent scam attempt as we know bitcoin = criminal money

Basically I think bitcoin protection itself.. it's depends on the consumers or on the users in transactions or anything that can be done. Bitcoin itself of course doesn't have a protection system or anything that's based on protection, it's like just only created and then free to doing anything I guess, whereby the whole decision making is submitted to the users and absence of one individual who can impose his/her wishes to the other individual.
so I guess the protection is created by its users themselves, do all the activities as safe as possible and can be avoid from hackers.

The relationship between the bitcoin and its consumer are protected by the jurisdiction of the law. Through this they always provide actions wherein there is no bias in every decision that they made.

Bitcoin now also allows a business to do a public audit of its assets. This in a way improves the consumer protection. A business can prove the use of its bitcoins without providing information about the source i.e. the customers. This gives scope for the consumer to do their research about the merchant before they do transactions.

Consumer protection is what we really needed but it is not embrace by bitcoins blockchain. Any transactions that is process every minute and every hour doesn't have a protection, the way to protect is to double check and be wise. Even in web wallet sites there is no consumer protection.

Bitcoin is not generally a criminal money but somehow can be considered to be as just like that because of its decentralized feature and anonymity which is a great tool to make crimes. Bitcoin cant be regulated which means it cant be controlled by anybody and talking about consumer protection its not possible since once bitcoin have been transferred theres no chance on making reversion of transactions. It can be regulated but only possible on those services which have being controlled by laws.

Bitcoin for now is not totally legal, due to decentralization of this coin. But since bitcoin are part of each country they are need to follow the rules and regulations of it. Moreover thru help of rules of each nation they can easily protect our consumer as users of this coin, so even though bitcoin is not totally legal they can protect our rights as users.

It seems to me that you exaggerate the anonymity of bitcoin. But it doesn't matter. Perhaps in the future the bitcoin community comes to what you need to create the transit server the type of arbitrator that will linger coins before you confirm the transaction with both parties. Then we can return the payment.

Right now, there are no laws protecting consumers with their usage of Bitcoin as a mode of payment. This can be really hard to do as sellers or establishments can take advantage of its volatility during and after a sale. During the sale they have the advantage to change the price regularly since the price of Bitcoin moves a lot, giving them the advantage of holding the price when it is favorable for them. Also after the sale, they can hold the Bitcoin for them to earn from capital gains which is really unjust for such establishments to do so that they can maximize their earnings. These are some of the problems I see that needs to be answered by the government when it comes to consumer protection.

In a system , you can only talk about protection where you have rights and in the case of bitcoin, there are no rights yet and therefore ; no remedy as to consumer protection.

Bitcoin is a pair to pair transaction and no third party until if there will be any regulations and then one can now take their complaints to a body or agency saddled with the responsibility of regulating it.

For now therefore, one has to be careful about the address you are sending to because once lost, you can't recover back.

There are no legislative actions at international level and we need Court precendents for this.Court practice is very poor about this cases.The Courts must define legal definition of bitcoin to regulate consumer protection,This is directly related to protection.But now,they said,that judges  
are not experts in this digital space.In my opinion,There must be used legal norms as in Contractual  agreement is regulated,despite the fact,that relations about bitcoin are not standart type of contractual agreements.In other cases there will be injustice,because we cann't protect our property.

Thank you for the advice...

"Consumer protection" is the buzzword used by industry incumbents to protect their industry by using the local governments' authority raising the barriers to entry.

Generally it results in fewer choices for consumers, and less competition.  Very often the result is that there are no good choices remaining.

Pre-emptive Consumer protections tend to accomplish the opposite of their legislative intent.

Bitcoin is making strides to make its currency and its use more secure to encourage growth and confidence. In order to get rid of a lot of myths about Bitcoin and its uses, these changes will change the Bitcoin’s reputation and the world’s trust in its service.

Bitcoin has it own protection but when it comes to buying and owning, the holder or consumer is always at risk.  The bitcoin holder must ensure that his/her bitcoin is well-protected from any hacking. Some governments are also taking steps to provide consumer protection by creating some regulations.

the explanation is quite satisfactory.

That will depend upon the countries that legalized and regulates bitcoin because if bitcoin is declared legal in a certain country, the government of that country is now a 100% responsible of the consumers welfare including protection in which equally the same protection with the consumers that are using fiat.

I dont think there are any  customer protection using bitcoin, as we know all of the transactions is almost anonymous, and we only know the person wallet address, that is why all of the important transaction using bitcoin is escrow, and we are choosing bitcoin because its decentralised, we dont want any supervision or tracking from anyone and that is causing bitcoin without any consumer protection

There are many websites out there that you can generate paper wallets on.  Best is to download the software in the computer and generate it there.  Then move the coin to the paper wallet.

I don't think that is possible unless government and bitcoin unite. But bitcoin and altcoins providing some helpful activities for that kind of protection. But a protection from the government it is impossible.

I think the company of bitcoin always consider the protection of the consumer or investors rather.
Since they are the reason why their business still exist; because they know on how to valued every customers dreams, they capture the hearts of the public resulting to a high demand.

From which threat you are asking of protection? But yes I want to mention that the contracts fixed with Bitcoin as a payments option are fully protected as many people have fear about this. The local laws are always applicable as long as your contract is legal. Everything will take place as usual, ONLY THE PAYMENT method will change. The only requirement is that this should be explicitly mentioned in the contract that you are making payment in Bitcoins. After this if the other party refuses to fulfill the contract you can seek legal help.