U.S. aims to track 'untraceable' prepaid cash cards

[sadpandatech]

http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/09/01/7526748-us-aims-to-track-untraceable-prepaid-cash-cards



Will be very interesting to see where that goes.

[1715064019]

1715064019

[1715064019]

1715064019

[Cryptoman]

I'm not really sure what the implications of this are.  Does this mean that someone buying a Green Dot Money Pak for $25 needs to identify himself?  If true, that's pretty draconian (but not unexpected).

[TheHeroMember]

This one's very interesting. 

[bitrebel]

I'm not really sure what the implications of this are.  Does this mean that someone buying a Green Dot Money Pak for $25 needs to identify himself?  If true, that's pretty draconian (but not unexpected).

This is what they would like to do.
Bitcoins will be just like e-bay and paypal if we are not careful.
First they will ignore it. Then they will accept it. They they will attempt to regulate it.
When its accepted everywhere, you will need I.D. to use it.

[niko]

This is what they would like to do.
Bitcoins will be just like e-bay and paypal if we are not careful.
First they will ignore it. Then they will accept it. They they will attempt to regulate it.
When its accepted everywhere, you will need I.D. to use it.

Even if things ever unfold that way, you still avoid supporting the fed who lives off of interest on fiat currency. 

[blacbe]

"As the federal government tells it, the money men behind the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackers would never have been identified had they not been lousy bankers:
"The 9/11 hijackers opened U.S. bank accounts, had face-to-face dealings with bank employees, signed signature cards and received wire transfers, all of which left financial footprints. Law enforcement was able to follow the trail, identify the hijackers and trace them back to their terror cells and confederates abroad.""

"Had the 9/11 terrorists used prepaid ... cards to cover their expenses, none of these financial footprints would have been available."



appeal to fear

besides who really funds al qaeda?

[Jack of Diamonds]

besides who really funds al qaeda?

They were funded from Saudi bank accounts. Relatively small sums too;
They received batches of $5,000 every now and then until they had enough for 9/11.

And yes, had they received bitcoins instead, and exchanged those for cash-in-mail on an exchange/privately (to a p.o. box)
there would've been literally zero trail to follow.

Same goes for Moneypak cards, prepaid gift visas etc.

[Litt]

besides who really funds al qaeda?

They were funded from Saudi bank accounts. Relatively small sums too;
They received batches of $5,000 every now and then until they had enough for 9/11.

And yes, had they received bitcoins instead, and exchanged those for cash-in-mail on an exchange/privately (to a p.o. box)
there would've been literally zero trail to follow.

Same goes for Moneypak cards, prepaid gift visas etc.

Yeah but who reallys funds al qaeda? lol who knows.. you would think with all the regulations there already they would already know this and stop this.

[blacbe]

besides who really funds al qaeda?

They were funded from Saudi bank accounts. Relatively small sums too;
They received batches of $5,000 every now and then until they had enough for 9/11.

And yes, had they received bitcoins instead, and exchanged those for cash-in-mail on an exchange/privately (to a p.o. box)
there would've been literally zero trail to follow.

Same goes for Moneypak cards, prepaid gift visas etc.

well they didn't really need to follow financial trials to find out who the alleged hijackers were. the hijacker's passports that survived annihilation of the plane and were found at ground zero were crucial in identifying the hijackers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwXgiLXj_8Y

here's a site debunking the allegation that the passports were crash proof
http://www.911myths.com/index.php/Personal_Effects_and_the_Crash-Proof_Passport

apparently some of the plane wasn't annihilated along with the passports.

[kloinko1n]

A dumb ass who believes that 'war-on-terror' shit.
There's a war going on alright: for your money.
And for your freedom, so you can't protest if they take more money.

Have a good day.

[Cryptoman]

I'm not really sure what the implications of this are.  Does this mean that someone buying a Green Dot Money Pak for $25 needs to identify himself?  If true, that's pretty draconian (but not unexpected).

This is what they would like to do.
Bitcoins will be just like e-bay and paypal if we are not careful.
First they will ignore it. Then they will accept it. They they will attempt to regulate it.
When its accepted everywhere, you will need I.D. to use it.

There's no mention of identification requirements on the Green Dot site, except if you transfer large amounts to PayPal, which has been a requirement for awhile.  This BS is supposed to go into effect this month, right?  I'm going to try to buy a Green Dot card later in the month, conveniently leaving my ID in the car.

[wolftaur]

There's no mention of identification requirements on the Green Dot site, except if you transfer large amounts to PayPal, which has been a requirement for awhile.  This BS is supposed to go into effect this month, right?  I'm going to try to buy a Green Dot card later in the month, conveniently leaving my ID in the car.

It may end up being irrelevant due to the "stupid merchant" factor. I have a debit card that has "ASK FOR ID" written in the signature strip. This technically makes the card invalid, because it isn't signed. I had to pull my ID out for photocopy at a medical lab at one point -- insurance thing. Well, I forgot my ID there. The lab I went to is nowhere near me, isn't on a bus route, and they wouldn't mail it back. I was without my ID for about five months.

Didn't have a single problem using my debit card...

And after five months of not actually being asked for ID I no longer had the habit of automatically presenting it along with the card. That was a few years ago. I've never been asked for my ID for my debit card. Only my health insurance.

[kloinko1n]

A dumb ass who believes that 'war-on-terror' shit.

Oh, wait! Let me ask Nelly, my robot:
Nelly, please analyse this:
1. prepaid cash cards existed at the time of 9/11
2. 'al qaeda' didn't use them.

And what I got back was strange and totally surprising.
The gears in her mechanical brain rattled and cracked.
Hydraulic fluid spilled out of all her joints from the pressure she put on her efforts to solve the problem.
Smoke escaped from her heating ears.
And, after a lot of clicking, crackling, ticking and wheezing, came the answer:

"1. al qaeda isn't stupid if they were able to organise such an attack"
"2. not using the anonymous cards is stupid."
"3. ergo: al qaeda is stupid."
"al qaeda isn't stupid..."
"al qaeda is stupid ..."
"al qaeda isn't stupid ..."
.
"click click crack"
"pssssstt!"
.
.
"watchdog timer override!"
"logical contradiction encountered, assumptions incorrect, al qaeda does not exist."
"thank you"

[onesalt]

idiots talking about terrorism: it's actually because companies lose massive amounts on pre-paid cash fraud. people use dodgy notes to buy them, get the card topped up and then leave without paying (which is usaully down to bad employee practice but is still a big problem) and use stolen cards to essentially legitimise funds from the card with no chance of it ever getting revoked. Really you'd be a fool to not know who the fuck is using them considering how much fraud gets put through them.

[sadpandatech]

idiots talking about terrorism: it's actually because companies lose massive amounts on pre-paid cash fraud. people use dodgy notes to buy them, get the card topped up and then leave without paying (which is usaully down to bad employee practice but is still a big problem) and use stolen cards to essentially legitimise funds from the card with no chance of it ever getting revoked. Really you'd be a fool to not know who the fuck is using them considering how much fraud gets put through them.

  I'm having a hard time following how a merchant who slides the card and oks the sending of funds from their bank account to the card companies would then be able to tell at the end of the night that some bad notes were precisely associated with that transaction and reverse it? hmmm  Yea, I could definetly see them having issues with stolen debit/credit cards being used to load them, but again this would be the merchnats problem. The later being much easier for the merchant to track down.

  Now, back to the subject at hand, it is most definetly not a merchant fraud issue and is only a terrorist one as far as that being the most catchy part of the Feds reasonings to use as a headline.  Please do look over the story again and try to read past the terroist parts.

  "In congressional testimony last year, FBI Director Robert Mueller called the use of prepaid cards a "shadow banking system" that had "impacted our ability to gather real-time financial intelligence."

The new rules not only are supposed to make it easier for the FBI and other agencies to track prepaid cards back to the original purchasers; they also require issuers to alert the government to any large or otherwise suspicious transactions, like those multiple $9,900 purchases. That can all add up to a pattern of evidence that could tip off investigators to larger plans that are in the works.

The rules take effect Sept. 27. They fill 69 pages as drawn up by the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a branch of the Treasury Department known as FinCEN, illustrating just how complicated the industry that manages prepaid cards really is."

Congressional testimony; http://www.fbi.gov/news/testimony/the-fbi-budget-for-fiscal-year-2011'
69 pages of new rules; http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/nr/html/20110726b.html