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[Anonymous]

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[FreeMoney]

The info posted on buybitcoins said that one person was using as many as 25 different credit cards. This must have only been possible because it was completely automated, right?

[Babylon]

If another exchange wants to try again with PayPal, I think there is a safer way to do it.

MtGox used PayPal's merchant interface, which is the logical way to do it, but it's quite attractive to those who have stolen a PayPal account, because they can initiate the BTC purchase and everything happens instantly.

Instead, the buyer could request the exchange to use PayPal's facility to send an "invoice" by email. When the buyer receives the PayPal "invoice", they then make the payment. The process can still be automated, and is almost as convenient.

But someone who has stolen a PayPal account is unlikely to want to get involved with emails back-and-forth. If they can't just spend the funds directly, they'll probably go to another site where they can.

I hope someone starts doing this, whether MTGox or a new exchange.  Paypal may be a crappy system, but it is what i have and it is what so many other people have that i think an easy interface between paypal and bitcoin is kind of vital.

[chrisdbc]

Would it be any safer to accept funds from "verified" paypal accounts only?

[idev]

Would it be any safer to accept funds from "verified" paypal accounts only?

But what if the verified account is hacked aswell !

[kiba]

Would it be any safer to accept funds from "verified" paypal accounts only?

But what if the verified account is hacked aswell !

Increased barrier, less likelihood of fraud.

[chrisdbc]

Would it be any safer to accept funds from "verified" paypal accounts only?

But what if the verified account is hacked aswell !

Are the fraudulent transactions mainly from hacked paypal accounts or paypal accounts backed by stolen credit cards? If it's the latter, then requiring verified accounts could help because of the extra bank account verification step.

[jgarzik]

If another exchange wants to try again with PayPal, I think there is a safer way to do it.

MtGox used PayPal's merchant interface, which is the logical way to do it, but it's quite attractive to those who have stolen a PayPal account, because they can initiate the BTC purchase and everything happens instantly.

Instead, the buyer could request the exchange to use PayPal's facility to send an "invoice" by email. When the buyer receives the PayPal "invoice", they then make the payment. The process can still be automated, and is almost as convenient.

But someone who has stolen a PayPal account is unlikely to want to get involved with emails back-and-forth. If they can't just spend the funds directly, they'll probably go to another site where they can.

As an additional measure of security, Paypal offers a facility where the merchant authorizes (places a hold on) funds.  That authorization lasts for up to 3 days.  A merchant can, for example, authorize (hold) for 48 hours, then complete the payment.

[jgarzik]

The info posted on buybitcoins said that one person was using as many as 25 different credit cards. This must have only been possible because it was completely automated, right?

Hardly.  Never underestimate the motivation of a thief to do this sort of manual labor.  Their pay rate was, what, $600/hr?

[Anonymous]

I recently came across Paypal mass payments.



To use this you need a premier or business account and become a verified member. The fees are a lot less using this method.

You need the other parties email address to create the mass payment txt file which you upload to paypal. You can pay up to 5000 people at one time as well.

Paypal mass payments cant be cancelled so no chargebacks would occur.

[Anonymous]

Paypal mass payments cant be cancelled so no chargebacks would occur.

Your source for this please?

I know that mass payments can't be cancelled by the legitimate sender, but nor can a regular PayPal payment. Where is the difference?

I signed up for a business account and as a verified user. Mass Pay doesnt use credit cards which means no chance of cc chargeback either. You have to actually have the money in your paypal account before you can use it.

Virtually the only way to get your money back from a masspay payment is to say you sent it to the wrong person & it was paid in error and you will have to possibly sign a statement that says this and fax it to them or email to get the money back.

I think the chance of you getting a chargeback using mass pay would be minimal to non-existent. I was over exaggerating when I said it would not exist.....but its pretty close to that.

[Anonymous]

I would be willing to let a trusted coder use my account to provide liquidity in the bitcoin marketplace and get us past this current problem. This would mean you need a confirmed email address to pay into the exchange. Mass Pay has an api that can be used.  The fees are also a lot less which means a small extra transaction fee could be charged and it would be no more expensive than a normal paypal transaction (which I call the "liquidity fee"). You can also receive mass payments if the other party has a confirmed email address.

Any takers for this experiment?

[mrich8]

This is an old topic I know but was ideas for MassPay abandoned because we could still charge it back or what?

It seems like a good idea. The trading site would let you place your order for coins to be paid with MassPay. For example 5 BTC at $3.20 USD each - total $16.00. When you press "Generate Order" the site will download a mass pay text file. If you are Premier or Business PayPal member you can log on and pay with this file.

You must pay with the cash in the account, no chargebacks possible that way. Also, you as the account holder, have to pay a 2% fee up to $1. So the masspay will send $16 to the trading site and you will pay a fee of $0.32 to PayPal.


Now this has no profit for the trading site so perhaps, you elevate the cost for each coin by 1-2% for profits and theoretical but unlikely PayPal disputes.

Such a site could be fully automated using the PayPal APIs, I am a PHP/MySQL developer.