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Bomb Explodes At PayPal Headquarters
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:31 PM
from the disgruntled-customers dept.
from the disgruntled-customers dept.
Pooua writes to tell us that an explosive device left outside of PayPal headquarters exploded last night. The explosion was powerful enough to knock out one of their plate glass windows but thankfully that was the only casualty of the blast. Perhaps they should have offered employee protection instead?
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Your Rights Online: Paypal Agrees to Consumer Protections 136 comments
davidwr writes "Paypal settled a suit with Maryland and 27 states. Among other things, they'll conspicuously advertise a contact phone number and staff it 14 hours a day and be much more forthcoming about when they will debit your bank account. For those of you who think Paypal Sucks, well, starting soon it sucks just a little less."
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Shouldn't be too difficult.. (Score:5, Funny)
Shouldn't be too difficult to find the culprit, just look for someone extremely dissatisfied with their service.
Seriously, anyone who thought they were having a bad time of it with PayPal will find that experience pales compared to the bad time they'll have for planting a bomb.
Re:Shouldn't be too difficult.. (Score:5, Funny)
Great, that narrowed down the list by about two. Any other ideas?
Parent
Re:Shouldn't be too difficult.. (Score:5, Funny)
yeah. paypal set the bomb off themselves. now, if anyone complains about paypal's service, they instantly become a suspect in a 'terrorist' act.
great way to guarantee customer satisfaction!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Shouldn't be too difficult.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Since we're talking about hypothetical conspiracies.
Paypal is owned by Ebay, who is largely controlled by the Saudis (don't actually know that, but it sounds good). The Bush Administration needed to demonstrate that we are still not safe in this country to the voting public (after all, it is an election year). So a call was placed to management at Ebay. Anyway, the Saudis worked with their contacts to find a bomber, who was more than happy to place the bomb (after all everyone knows there'
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I actually tried to use the "Safe Harbor" once. First they told me that I had to wait for the account to be cleaned out. Then they told me to file with my credit card company. Some "Safe Harbor" I'm actually surprised it did not happen sooner, they really have screwed a lot of people along the way.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Also, I must be one of their rare happy customers - two weeks ago somehow my Paypal account was compromised and several thousand USD was transfered around, with no fuss at all every single one of those transactions have been reversed at no cost to myself. All it took was 20 minutes to a local rate number, no queues, very helpf
PayPal follow up email (Score:3, Funny)
A) Excellent
B) Good
C) Average
D) Poor
E) Want to bomb your damn company
Thank you!
Re:Shouldn't be too difficult.. (Score:4, Funny)
There is absolutely no way that a customer could have planted this bomb. Nobody who has ever been a PayPal customer has any idea how to contact PayPal, let alone their actual physical address...
Parent
I imagine... (Score:4, Funny)
Chargeback my account eh!!?
I imagine when some saw a headline "PayPal Bombed" they thought, "They certainly have."
Parent
Re:I imagine... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes I look upon this pathetic excuse for a terrorist act and agree that it is the biggest incident of domestic terrorism in five years the second largest in the past fifteen years, third largest in decades.
With that in mind I look at the 'war on terror' we wage that has caused more terror and death than the United States has seen as a result of domestic terror. Yes, I find the situation so sad that it transcends sadness and can only be comprehended as a joke.
Parent
Re:I imagine... (Score:5, Informative)
I suppose extremists firebombing a neuro-scientist's neighbor doesn't count, since they bombed the wrong house.
And what about bombings at abortion clinics, which have been fairly widespread since the 1970's. A friend of my family works at an abortion clinic as a counselor who tries to persuade patients not to have abortions, and her car was set on fire by abortion protestors.
I'm not sure how you define domestic terrorism, but it hardly seems that this is the largest act of domestic terrorism this year, much less out of the last 5.
Parent
I'm not worthy of that opener...here is my best (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
"Don't kill people, or we'll kill you." Doesn't it strike you as being hypocritical to have a death penalty when there's a law against killing people? Not to mention that in our system it actually costs more to kill someone than to keep them in prison for life.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Fixed.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Fixed.
Sorry, you had still missed a spot. Better now.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You know, the kids who are shooting up schools have typically been the subject of a systematic policy of harassment that is carried out by the students but with the effective blessing of the administration which does nothing to prevent it. the people really responsible for the columbine massacre (for example) are the members of the administration who did nothing to prevent bullying. if I'd had access to a gun while I was in high school, there were times when I very likely would have brought it to school an
Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Surprised it took this long (Score:5, Funny)
Great. Now if they start offering actual service.. (Score:5, Funny)
Halloween parties at PayPal... (Score:5, Funny)
So I've heard.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Next time, I'd go with the "Treat".
Not very big (Score:5, Interesting)
Looks more like the sort of thing I used to knock up as a teenager - Sodium Chlorate and sugar anyone?
I don't get it (Score:3, Insightful)
I get a better deal with an ATM card through paypal than I get through my own bank. I actually collect interest on all my money as if it were a savings account. My "free" checking at my bank doesn't give me interest on money in my checking account. And if I put money in my savings account I can get fined for taking money out of it too often.
If you want to go around bombing finanicial institutions why not go after the ones that are actually greedy and evil. (seriously I am not recommending this, instead of a bomb why not write a nasty letter or post a rant/complaint in your blog to boycott the company)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Paypal's service is legendary (Score:5, Informative)
If you're using the service to buy and sell on eBay, and everything else in the transaction goes smoothly, then PayPal workd fine. However, if you have a problem (with a buyer or seller) and you try and take it up with PayPal, you're going to get screwed. Let me explain how it works:
If you are a seller, and you ship and you "collect" money from PayPal and ship the item you sold, if the seller complains to PayPal (they can claim they didn't get the item, that it wasn't as advertised, etc.) PayPal will take the money out of your account because the transaction was "fraudulent" -- your loss: one item (which you shipped) since you won't be seeing the money. If you are a buyer, it works the other way around. If you pay for something and it never arrives, PayPal will refuse to refund the money.
As far as I can tell, in instances where there is a dispute, PayPal collects the money for themselves and the buyer and seller are out of luck. Some of this seems to be based on "who complains first" but generally if you use PayPal and have a problem, you can kiss your money goodbye. Add to this the fact that PayPal constantly pushes linking your PayPal account to your "real" bank account (apparently so they can clean you out in one fell swoop) and you have a recipe for... well, I'd say about 5 lbs of ammonium nitrate, some black powder, and a time-delay fuse.
Parent
Funny? (Score:5, Insightful)
I just don't find any of this funny. Planting a bomb anywhere but in strict controlled testing areas is not a joke. Obviously this was at least meant to damage the building, and possibly even to harm people. Imagine for a minute that you're a tech at this location, regardless of who it is. You're not responsible for corporate policy. Yet you're in as much, or more danger from an attack like this than those who do make the decisions.
I'm just glad nobody was hurt, and that the damage was relatively minor. I hope the culprit or culprits are caught quickly, and dealt with harshly.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
However, due to an odd mixture of customer dissatisfaction, slightly warped senses of drama and poetic justice, and good old-fashioned schadenfreude, I still chuckled.
Humans, eh?
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Funny? (Score:5, Funny)
-Steve
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That being said, two things: honestly ask yourself which side you fall on the Palestinian/Israeli issue. Palestinian plants a bomb in a cafe' because that's all they can do, they can't attack non-civs with actual military success (note the "military" limit to the word "success"). By the same token, if corporation X deprives someone of their life, liberty, and persuit of happiness...do you really think the courts are going to care in this extreme capitalism worl
I miss the good old days (Score:3, Funny)
Justice (Score:3, Interesting)
I am a casual ebay user, and probably sell roughly 10 items a year. Since paypal is the defacto standard there, I use them and have it linked to my checking account to transfer payments to myself. Well, I recently sold an old video card for $100 and was paid for it through the paypal service. Now, after hearing about people not being able to transfer their funds etc, I always immediately transfer the $$$ to my checking account. So, I have my $100. 5 days later, paypal sends me a notice saying that the payment might be fraudulent and is being investigated. 2 days later, they say it is indeed fraudulent, and that $100 is being deducted from my paypal account. Great, I already shipped the item, so I call paypal, spend an hour on hold, and finally talk to someone. The only response I get is "sorry, can't do anything about it. Sorry, can't tell you the reason it was fraudulent." Now I already have the money in my checking, so its not like I'm totally screwed, but I can't use my account becuase it has that negative balance on it. Any money into it will automatically go against it. I can't cancel either becuase of it.
They also told me that my item was not valid for seller protectrion because it is an electronic item. Why the hell does it matter what item was sold???? I don't udnerstand why I am responsible for the fraudulent transaction when PayPal deemed this other users account valid and processed the payment in the first place. This is another example of a business who thinks that they can do business without any risk what-so-ever. Just screw the end user.
btw... If anyone has had a similar experience and has some advice as to how I can cancel this account or otherwise solve the problem, please let me know!
I knew . . . (Score:5, Funny)
Were eBay affected by this? I've just got an email from them now . . .
For PayPal, No Sympathy (Score:4, Insightful)
I've been ripped off by PayPal twice, with absolutely no recourse whatsoever to get things rectified. The amounts involved are small enough that its not worth getting the legal system involved, but big enough that it's intensely irrirating. I think PayPal's business model is at least partly based on having free will to screw over individual customers in this manner.
While I don't even slightly agree with the bomber's methods, I do understand what would drive them to do this. Individuals are powerless against PayPal, so its no suprise they will lash out any way they can. This is a classic terrorist attack in that sense - someone who felt they had no options left, so they turned to the increasingly commonly accepted equalizer: bombings.
The very moment there is a viable alterntive to PayPal, I'll be switching (Google, are you listening? I'm getting desperate here!).
Negative Feedback (Score:4, Funny)
Sign of the times (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Because it's very easy to get your hands on low-grade nuclear material, wrap it around a conventional explosive, and create a "dirty bomb" that will throw a bunch of nuclear crap around and render the neighborhood effectively uninhabitable until it can be cleaned up. Do it in the rain and that might require digging up tons and tons of dirt and hauling it off, etc etc.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Yeah. I'm sure in the future plutonium will be available at every corner drugstore, but in 2006 it's a little hard to come by.
Re:Radiological?? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:What a shame (Score:5, Insightful)
I may not like some (a lot) of PayPall's policies, and I might wish paypall to go out of business. That said why do the 20-odd hackers that were in the building at the time deserve to be bombed?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
How the term jumped over to fission/fusion-based weapons, I couldn't begin to guess.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I grew up in Missouri... and in my home city one of the larger industries is the call center industry. There are litterally dozens of _very_ large call centers in the city to choose from and they actually all pay well and give good benefits (they are competing for the workforce).
The reason they're all in Missouri is because of the accent... ie. none. Most Missourians (disregarding the hill-billys!) have a fairly neutral accent which lends itself well t