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Comment by i_have_an_idea | Hacker News Reader

Due to AML regulations, banks and e-money institutions are required by law to perform KYC procedures on their customers. That invariably means storing and verifying your govt issued ID.

If you don't want to provide your ID, then that essentially limits your options to:

1) cash

2) crypto (assuming you never interface with exchanges/banks)

3) use e-money services up to the cumulative amount that triggers the KYC process. I forget what that is, but probably a few hundred dollars.

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> use e-money services up to the amount that triggers the KYC process. I forget what that is, but probably a few hundred dollars.

Just FYI this is not viable because the limit is cumulative. So you can't just fly under the radar with a bunch of small transactions. Once you hit the KYC limit, ID becomes mandatory.

It's also a crime to organize transactions in this way https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structuring

Did you read the article that you linked?

There is nothing illegal about using an e-money service for a few small transactions. When you eventually reach the cumulative amount that triggers the KYC process, you are under no obligation to complete it and refusing to do so is not "structuring".

Of course, they will suspend your account until you're in compliance with their KYC process.

I didn't mean to imply that it's per transaction.

> That invariably means storing and verifying your govt issued ID.

I get the verifying part, but why is storing after the verification needed?

Record retention schedule for compliance. Auditors and regulators will come ask for it (or rather, a sampling demonstrating you are retaining the records).

(this is a component of my work at a fintech)

Any reason to not store a hash or something? Both you and the govt should have matching info on a person.

Because that is not the retention requirement unfortunately. I’d love for the US gov to allow identity proofing with Login.gov so we get a Boolean or tokenized response and that’d be sufficient (with the record of that response being our obligation to retain), we’re just not there yet.

That'd be great for everyone. A citizen would be able to view and revoke tokens.

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