Two interesting emails I received today...

[KeyserSoze]

SA makes more off of IWC in a week than all the members here could put in.  Also, I don't think we're all that interested in recruiting off the 3rd most retarded forum on the internet.

OK, shucks. I guess I will continue to use the SA bandwidth for free, and just be satisfied I made it up to the 3rd most retarded site. If you have a list somewhere I'd like to work my way up to the 4th most retarded, and then on UP, UP UP, with the hope one day I'll be recruited to the Big Leagues.

[julz]

 Also, I don't think we're all that interested in recruiting off the 3rd most retarded forum on the internet.

wait...  creationists,bronies,troofers,tea partiers...  argh!?? How did we get to number 3?
oh - that's right, we've probably got them all   

[tvbcof]

I'd join SA if they took Bitcoin. That's at least 3 people I've seen offer to join. $30 SA could make right now if they took Bitcoin. Though I am curious if they'd rook us for more lulz instead of seeing an opportunity to gain more users (and money). I can see a segment of the userbase preferring to point and laugh like Nelson (from the Simpsons). "HA HA!" That would be unfortunate because I found their site pretty fun and helpful during the time of my disagreement with Bitmole.

SA makes more off of IWC in a week than all the members here could put in.  Also, I don't think we're all that interested in recruiting off the 3rd most retarded forum on the internet.

Lest you get to full of yourselves, I would suggest that from what I've seen the bell curve has some not insignificant overlap.

[JeffK]

A business or merchant? Sure I would trust them. Another untrusted exchange? Hell no, given the acceptance of scams and history of exchange problems and scams as made apparent by these forums, it is easy to see that there are no 'trustworthy' exchanges, especially given the anonymous nature of many of them.

I'm not clear on why exchanges such as mtgox and tradehill are not considered reasonably trustworthy.
I had a small amount on deposit with mtgox during their major security issue - and from my perspective it was resolved pretty well.  Security breaches and information disclosures from major corporations happen all the time - and yet perhaps because of their sheer scale, their reputation doesn't seem to suffer as much as mtgox's has.

Mtgox were not only reasonably communicative about what was going on - but provided compensation in the form of temporary reduced fees + free yubikeys for those affected. 

My problem with mtgox at the moment is that they don't appear to be engineered for high volume trading.
It's apparent that during higher volume trading both mtgoxlive and the manual trading interface become unresponsive. 
I suspect that this is a lack of concurrency in the programming - and may even be contributing to the overall price instability. People can't get in to execute their desired trades at the times they most want to! 

I do however trust that they have a (belatedly) strong security focus, and a profitable business model as evidenced by their ability to take on the books of bitomat.pl and compensate their users.

Major corporations have things like "PCI compliance" and "hardware firewalls". How am I supposed to trust that mtgox or Tradehill won't have another break-in and just run with the money? Seriously, the operations are all pretty much 'two guys in an apartment'.

Bitcoin offers no incentive for businesses right now, and with the risk and hassle it is hardly 'free money'

[tvbcof]

Major corporations have things like "PCI compliance"

at least one exchange seems to:

  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=24802.0

Maybe SA can dig at it a little to see if they are lying.  (Should be my job, but I'm lazy.)

and "hardware firewalls".

Highly important...to people who don't know much about firewalls that is.

How am I supposed to trust that mtgox or Tradehill won't have another break-in and just run with the money?

You're not.  If you cannot figure out how to mitigate the risk to your level of tolerance, I would advise you not to play.

Seriously, the operations are all pretty much 'two guys in an apartment'.

Bitcoin offers no incentive for businesses right now, and with the risk and hassle it is hardly 'free money'

If someone wanted to give me BTC or $$$, I would take either.  I could deal with either even without the convenience of the copy/paste operation reportedly available to bit-pay users.

Ya know what seems to me to be a bit on the 'tard side though?  Giving your CC info out to a lot of organizations.  SA not the least of them.

[wolftaur]

Major corporations have things like "PCI compliance"

at least one exchange seems to:

  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=24802.0

Maybe SA can dig at it a little to see if they are lying.  (Should be my job, but I'm lazy.)

As I recall the PCI compliance rules change very, very wildly by the type of organization and its size. At one of my former jobs we were PCI compliant, supposedly, but when there are only 3 employees a "self-audit" is considered acceptable and they state that, basically, that either the IT people can self-audit, or the owner of the company can.

Our owner walks into my office, and asks if we run a mail server. I say no. He sticks the "We are PCI compliant" text in a Word document and tells me to put that on the website.

He didn't even know what operating system our web server ran or what company we were buying our internet access from, and he declared us PCI compliant with one question.

I checked. At least at the time that was 100% acceptable for a company with only 3 employees.

So Tradehill could easily be PCI compliant. I just don't think the fact they are means much of anything at all. :/

[RandyFolds]

Ya know what seems to me to be a bit on the 'tard side though?  Giving your CC info out to a lot of organizations.  SA not the least of them.

Yeah. God forbid you use your credit card for what it's intended for. Talk about the 'tard side...

[wolftaur]

Ya know what seems to me to be a bit on the 'tard side though?  Giving your CC info out to a lot of organizations.  SA not the least of them.

Yeah. God forbid you use your credit card for what it's intended for. Talk about the 'tard side...

Three times in the last year, my roommate and I have both found our ATM/debit cards locked out, and a few days later we get new ones in the mail, along with a letter basically saying that the cards were compromised, some hacker stole them from a merchant we shop at, and advising us to be careful about where we spend, and in particular most internet stores have very poor security.

My roommate and I do a shared budget and the way we shuffle things is kinda specific. First day of the month the full amount of the rent comes out of his bank account. All of the bills are paid in full out of mine as they come over the month, along with all the food.

The only two places my roommate's card had ever been used in two out of the three cases where the bank found his card was among a list of stolen numbers were...

The bank, and the largest chain of gas stations in the state.

[RandyFolds]

Ya know what seems to me to be a bit on the 'tard side though?  Giving your CC info out to a lot of organizations.  SA not the least of them.

Yeah. God forbid you use your credit card for what it's intended for. Talk about the 'tard side...

Three times in the last year, my roommate and I have both found our ATM/debit cards locked out, and a few days later we get new ones in the mail, along with a letter basically saying that the cards were compromised, some hacker stole them from a merchant we shop at, and advising us to be careful about where we spend, and in particular most internet stores have very poor security.

My roommate and I do a shared budget and the way we shuffle things is kinda specific. First day of the month the full amount of the rent comes out of his bank account. All of the bills are paid in full out of mine as they come over the month, along with all the food.

The only two places my roommate's card had ever been used in two out of the three cases where the bank found his card was among a list of stolen numbers were...

The bank, and the largest chain of gas stations in the state.

Exactly...As a loose rule, you hand it to the stupidest, poorest and youngest/most irresponsible people in society every time you use it. They are the ones working as cashiers. The internet is no different.

I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

[tvbcof]

Ya know what seems to me to be a bit on the 'tard side though?  Giving your CC info out to a lot of organizations.  SA not the least of them.

Yeah. God forbid you use your credit card for what it's intended for. Talk about the 'tard side...

You mean like giving the info to an organization who, in spite of having boat loads of revenue (so claims FAtlas), cannot even keep their forum running?

BTW, do you pay and extra $120/yr for SA search function?  -snicker-

[Gerken]

No it gets subsidized by our troll paychecks.  -butterfingers-

[tvbcof]

...
I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

Ya, I thoroughly enjoyed the hours I spent on the phone with Visa when that happened to me.  I just hope it happens again and again so I have someone to talk to and won't be so lonely.

[wolftaur]

Exactly...As a loose rule, you hand it to the stupidest, poorest and youngest/most irresponsible people in society every time you use it. They are the ones working as cashiers. The internet is no different.

I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

We actually have never had the cards used fraudulently. There's never transactions our bank has to eat. They find out some numbers may have been compromised and proactively mark the WHOLE LOT as stolen.

I give a flying fuck because the last time that happened we were just about out of food and needed to go grocery shopping and had no way to pay for groceries. The grocery store and the bank are in 100% opposite directions and the bank doesn't even have a branch on the bus route. I had to borrow cash from a neighbor.

[RandyFolds]

...
I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

Ya, I thoroughly enjoyed the hours I spent on the phone with Visa when that happened to me.  I just hope it happens again and again so I have someone to talk to and won't be so lonely.

1. Never use cards or electronic banking again.
2. Stuff your mattress full of cash, and buy a pistol.
3. Don't worry about the big bad skimmers taking all your credit.
4. ? ? ?

You can live in a fucking hole, or you can use your resources for what they were intended.

[RandyFolds]

Exactly...As a loose rule, you hand it to the stupidest, poorest and youngest/most irresponsible people in society every time you use it. They are the ones working as cashiers. The internet is no different.

I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

We actually have never had the cards used fraudulently. There's never transactions our bank has to eat. They find out some numbers may have been compromised and proactively mark the WHOLE LOT as stolen.

I give a flying fuck because the last time that happened we were just about out of food and needed to go grocery shopping and had no way to pay for groceries. The grocery store and the bank are in 100% opposite directions and the bank doesn't even have a branch on the bus route. I had to borrow cash from a neighbor.

Every time I travel, my cards get locked, even if I call the bank and arrange for it NOT to happen. It's bullshit, but it's the cost of doing business. I have also had to hit virtual strangers up for food and money because of it. It's no fun, but it's a small, small price for the convenience (particularly with credit vs. debit).

Have some cash on hand is the take home message.

[tvbcof]

...
I have also had my card skimmed at a gas station. Frankly, I don't give a flying fuck who steals my credit card number as long as I am not on the hook for it.

Ya, I thoroughly enjoyed the hours I spent on the phone with Visa when that happened to me.  I just hope it happens again and again so I have someone to talk to and won't be so lonely.

1. Never use cards or electronic banking again.
2. Stuff your mattress full of cash, and buy a pistol.
3. Don't worry about the big bad skimmers taking all your credit.
4. ? ? ?

You can live in a fucking hole, or you can use your resources for what they were intended.

I get it.  I'm to use my resources for a custom avatar on SA!  Thanks you for showing me the  light.

[Minsc]

Bruce, you posted the email addresses publically without any obfuscation.  They now have been scraped and will be spammed to death.

fair game, anytime you email anyone, always expect they will reveal it.

Common decency?

please understand the internet has not line to cross in the area of morality. "decency" is mostly non existent here on the internet.

Well the guy who posted them not only is non-anonymous, he is trying to get a good reputation again.

[Stalin-chan]

Sorry SA is a lot more secure and trustworthy than your gas station apparently, because i've never heard of anyone hacking SA and stealing credit cards.

Sounds like you have some pretty shitty judgement on where to spend your money and buy gas.

[wolftaur]

Sorry SA is a lot more secure and trustworthy than your gas station apparently, because i've never heard of anyone hacking SA and stealing credit cards.

Sounds like you have some pretty shitty judgement on where to spend your money and buy gas.

Excuse me dude, but stuff it.

One, you completely missed my point, which was specifically to say that the perception "small internet thingie dangerous, big business good" for credit card safety is a crock of shit.

Two, you assume I actually buy gas. I don't. I can't drive because of a vision problem. Sometimes, if I can't get a ride to the store, I have to go pick up a food item or two. That gas station happens to be the only place within walking distance. So it's not actually "shitty judgment" at all, it's the only place I can go in that situation.

You've been pretty intelligent in the other threads where we've both been talking, try to keep that up please.

[tvbcof]

Sorry SA is a lot more secure and trustworthy than your gas station apparently, because i've never heard of anyone hacking SA and stealing credit cards.

Sounds like you have some pretty shitty judgement on where to spend your money and buy gas.

I caution people about the gas station near the rental car return of IAD.  But I cannot say for sure that that is where mine got nicked...the people who helpfully hold my USD form of money did not see fit to bless me with that kind of info.  I use greenbacks for shady deals (like buying gas) these days.

And I would use BTC for shady internet related stuff like SA.  Just because you nobody has poked you yet (to the best of your knowledge) does not mean that you have not dropped your trousers and assumed the position.