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Comment by 2drew3 | Hacker News Reader

More like once out of 30k+ transactions. PayPal, AirBnB, and Raise all faced similar challenges.

purse.io's UI emphasizes the discounts you can get, by having a slider from 0% - 50% when you put in your wishlist. They claim they're just matchmaking with a buyer really interested in Bitcoin, but really, there's no way that 50% discounts on Amazon would ever happen, unless it's money laundering or CC fraud. And even then, 20% is really skeptical.

FoldApp seems to just be subsidizing purchases with VC money for adoption. It doesn't seem to be going well.

See also: Flooz, of which 20% of their transactions were fraudulent: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flooz.com

So the UI allows users to set a discount rate, similar to the way you set a limit order on etrade or Name Your Price on Priceline. I can place an order to buy AAPL for $100 or bid to stay in a 5 star hotel for $10. Doesn't mean they will get filled.

But they will be filled. By people who are very eager to cash out of some stolen credit cards or need some dirty money in someone else's hands. And, bonus points, in a way that makes the transaction irreversible.

Or, more likely, someone will jump in front of that request for 50% and ask for 45%. Then 40%, then 30, then 20 and then 8%. It's a market.

I do agree, though, that those very high discounts should be a red flag, if they're for any serious money. Stuff for $5 with a 50% discount is no big deal if someone just wants ot be rid of a card and doesn't mind losing a couple bux, which they'd end up paying in fees buying BTC anyway.

German police searched a house and seized stuff for months in one case[1], Amazon reversed gift credit in another[2].

Obviously this is no proof that fraud is rampant, but I still lean toward thinking fraud is too likely for me to want to be involved with using purse.io, especially if I wanted a good deal (big discount = more likely it's a carder cashing out a stolen card.) If nothing else these stories show there's a small chance you might get burned pretty badly. Has anything significantly changed to remove or lessen the risk?

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2po40d/since_my_ho... [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2eqcnv/do_not_purc...

Restrictions on buyers (unverified users are limited, 6 levels), social verification, behavior analytics (sift science), among others. User was made whole, police dropped the case, and we introduced $10,0000 guarantee. Not an excuse, but we were a team of 2 when that transaction happened, and it was 3 months after we started while we were in an accelerator.

I have to admit, I asked the question rhetorically expecting that nothing has changed, but it's good to know some progress has been made.

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