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Comment by rootusrootus | Hacker News Reader

As much as I used to hate them, I've now gained an appreciation for PayPal for this kind of stuff. For when I don't want to give my credit card to yet another vendor to possibly be compromised, or manage a sketchy subscription, PayPal is a pretty good solution. I do prefer Apple, but not every subscription can be bought that way.

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I recommend privacy.com. It's bulletproof. Single use card? Check. Merchant-locked? Check. You are in control. It costs $0.

Don't you pay more if you use Apple instead of Paypal?

Sometimes, but not always. As long as the difference is not too significant, the control over the subscription is worth it to me. Some people don't like 'em, I get it, but when you stay primarily inside their ecosystem it does work pretty seamlessly for most things.

Yeah PayPal is pretty good here. There's a page that lists all your billing subscriptions and you can cancel them right there.

It's a shame credit cards don't offer the same thing (Chase is able to list them all but provides no contact information or ability to revoke authorization)

The two banks I use provide information about your subscriptions and allow you to cancel any of them with a click of a button. I'm not in the US though (relatively poor "global South"); sometimes it pays to get technology with a significant delay.

One of them can also create zero-cost virtual Visa Golds in a couple of minutes. If I need to use a really sketchy service, I simply create a throwaway card, put a bit of cash there, pay for what I need, and then delete the card.

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