Whew! Thank you,Paypal

[Canuckistanian]

I just paid a donation to DU and signed up for Paypal at the same time.

What an ordeal! 5 email exchanges and several info pages filled out.

But I succeeded and I'm glad there are sufficient security procedures on Paypal to make sure I am who I say I am.

I feel relieved.

[Bobbieo]

1. I have gotten 3 recent messages supposedly from Paypal

telling me so and so has added their e-mail address to my account. And they want to me fill in all the details of my account. Believe it is another scam!!! Am I right?

[Canuckistanian]

2. Right you are, it's a scam

If you recall, they asked you two personal questions during sign-up. Did this emailer ask you those questions?

They advise you that if you have any doubts, to enter the URL of the main Paypal site and login there.

Seems like sensible advice.

[Bobbieo]

3. Yes, they asked the personal questions. I deleted the messages.

[Canuckistanian]

4. If you have any doubts, blow off the emails

And DO NOT respond to them.

Go to the main Paypal site.

You have good instincts.

[gatorboy]

5. My wife loves to respond to them.

Under password, she likes to send back "Go Fuck Yourself." :P

[Ghost in the Machine]

14. There are a lot of scammers on the internet, and they prey on PayPal

users and online shoppers. It's called "phishing" (fishing for information), these guys send out THOUSANDS of emails to address lists they have obtained. They know out of 10,000 emails sent, maybe a handful of people will be naive enough to respond. Any suspect emails should be forwarded to [e-mail] and they will track these criminals down. I turn in at least 3 per month myself.

Any offical correspondence from PayPal will address you by your real name, the one you registered with, and not "Dear PayPal Customer" or "Dear "[e-mail]".

I've had PayPal accounts for a while now, both a personal and a business account, and have never had any problems with them. If your wife is considering an account for her business, I would recommend the Business Account. It's only $20/mo... and includes Virtual Terminal where she can accept credit cards over the phone, via emailed info, or in person, wherever she has an internet connection. If she doesn't need that, the free Premier Account would be my next recommendation.

Hope this helps, and if your wife does sign up for an account and is going to be selling online, I would suggest checking out THIS as an extra precaution.

[skids]

6. It's partially why I don't use paypal...

...so I don't even have to wonder.

They effectively have a monopoly on receipt of micropayments, at least until Google Base starts up in earnest or Amazon Buddy System gets improved a whole lot.

As such, they seem to be under relentless attack, and the quality of deception in the phishing attacks is much higher than normal. Not that such as I would be fooled, but eventually someone's going to find a non-socially-engineered hole and suck a bunch of cash out.

[pansypoo53219]

8. yep

i may loose ebay sales, but i ain't joining that club.

plus it would be me who has to pay for fraud. and i am against credit anyways. destroying america. if everybodies credit cards disappeared, where would our economy be?

[Canuckistanian]

10. Are there any serious charges against Paypal?

My wife is thinking of setting up a Paypal account for her business.

I haven't heard anything on the news or even here about Paypal "irregularities".

Is there any cause to be concerned?

[sandnsea]

15. I've had Paypal for years

A lot of my clients have too. None of us has had any problem. Skinner's got it with DU, ask him. You just never open your account from an email, that's all. NEVER. And exercise the same kind of good judgment you would with clients who walked in the front door. I think the reason people run into problems on the internet is they forget basic rules of life, if it seems to good to be true it probably is - and trust your instincts about a person or transaction, not just their credentials. She should be fine - but if you're really worried, use a separate bank account or credit card for Paypal and only Paypal. That way if you have a problem, the damages are limited.

[blonndee]

19. Also, forward those messages to

[e-mail]. That way the real paypal knows about the email AND you will get an email from paypal confirming that the email you sent them was not authentic.

[0007]

7. I hate Paypal.

[The_Casual_Observer]

9. This is the best post of the week.

Thanks for the good vibe! :toast:

[Canuckistanian]

11. It seems like some people are not impressed

But I came away with a feeling of trust.

And that's important in these days of online scams, and I've seen a few of them in my 12 years of Internet experience.

[frebrd]

12. PayPal wants to hear about phishing ...

e-mails with their name on them.

If you forward them to [e-mail] you'll get an acknowledgement pretty quickly. Usually they'll send a follow-up later, after they check it out.

[hobbit709]

13. Paypal knows who you are

A real message from them addresses you by name and also has a message at your account. Any message that starts out "customer" or "account holder" is phony. If you click on the link on any of these "phishing" emails you will note the URL is not really from who it says it is.

[tech3149]

16. It may be a pain and it may make you broke but

PayPal has kept my few dollars going to WhiteRose, Guy James, Bartcop, DU, and Radiopower for a few years now. Hopefully, I won't be begging on the street to get my fix, but it will still be worth it.

[deacon]

17. Just NEVER use an email to login to paypal, always go directly

to their site.

[Raine]

18. I like Paypal

I haven't had a problem. I just keep a low amount of money in the account I use for Paypal so if by chance a scammer should manage to get into it they wouldn't get more than a nominal amount of money.

[terrya]

20. It may be a hassle joining, but I like PayPal

I've never had a bad experience with them. Good customer service.