Anonymous Threatens Robin Hood Attacks Against Banks 529
gManZboy writes "Just in time for the holidays, hacktivist collective Anonymous has announced that it has teamed up with like-minded group TeaMp0isoN to donate to charity. The catch: they're using stolen credit data from big banks to make donations, in a campaign they're calling Operation Robin Hood. Is the #OpRobinHood campaign for real, or like previous threats against Wall Street and Facebook, just another hoax? Aesthetically, at least, the OpRobinHood video ticks all of the traditional Anonymous aesthetic requirements: a mashed-up 'p0isoaNoN' logo (green on black), a liberal dose of swelling choral music (via that movie trailer staple 'Europa,' by Globus), together with selected clips of Kevin Costner as Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves."
Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:4, Insightful)
First they ignore you,
then they laugh at you,
then they fight you,
then you win.
Of course spineless always passive losers like you, with their crab mentality, will never know that, since you would never dare to endure a short period of bigger pain, but, in your cowardly short-sightedness, choose to live in the usual pain forever.
TL;DR: No pain, no gain, you sissy!
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Funny)
First they ignore you,
then they laugh at you,
then they fight you,
then you get the attention of Fox News,
then you get incinerated by a Predator drone.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Funny)
Providing the unseen "?" is "Sell drone-aircraft to the US Government", then yes, next step is Profit.
Otherwise, next step is "Feed local bacteria for several weeks.".
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Funny)
then you get incinerated by a Predator drone.
A friendly [deviantart.net] Predator drone.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
then you get incinerated by a Predator drone.
How long till one gets hacked for epic lulz? Fox News should be worried!
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
If they steal credit card data, how is that going to hurt the banks ? It's just going to hurt the people whose credit card data was stolen.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:4, Informative)
Banks refund their consumers in the case of stolen cards data / fraud.
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Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Informative)
The recipient of an invalid transaction (in this case the charities) often have to pay expenses for the reversal.
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Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
If your credit card / account was used in a different country or obviously not possible to be you making the transactions then you are damn lucky. In most cases though you are dealing with identify theft in your general area like a city or state. In these situations you have to prove that you are Innocent which is damn near impossible. In fact the credit card companies try to make it as difficult as possible for you to prove your Innocent.
So during Christmas time and banks dealing with thousands (tens of thousands?) of extra malice credit card transactions on top of what they normally would at this time of year I can't imagine the banks trying to make it easier for their customers. It will be in fact the most difficult time of the year for the customers to deal with this.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Interesting)
Your bank sucks bro. My DBS card center called me once on the suspicious activity right after the charge by an ID thief and with my approval proceed to reverse, cancel, cancel the card, issue me a new card in the mail while keeping the old account number all on the same phone call. I asked them how they know it wasn't me, they said they analyze my previous spending pattern (I only use my card for online payments) and notice this is a weird large sum offline payment. Totally wow'ed me omfg112 props!!
In the fierce competitive banking environment such as Hong Kong, people actually work hard to win your business.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Interesting)
As GP said, if usage falls outside your normal usage pattern, they'll detect it.
Chances are that if those black hats use a thousand credit cards, atleast a few dozen of them will look like normal usage patterns.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe this is a UK thing but twice my card has been ripped off and both times Visa literally just read out each transaction one after the other and cancelled everything I replied "no" to. Took a matter of minutes with no kind of arguing. I didn't even have to queue for the handler. New card in the post day after next.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Informative)
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In these situations you have to prove that you are Innocent which is damn near impossible.
My house was broken into and a box of blank checks stolen in April. I'm still dealing with the idiots at the Sangamon County State's Attorney office, who are harrassing me about -- get this -- bounced checks. Hell yes they bounced, I closed the account the day after the burglary. None of those bounced checks have my signature, so the State's Attorney is going to look damned foolish when the judge sees that the signatu
Charity will lose due to higher processing fees (Score:5, Insightful)
The owners of the card won't be liable for the charges dumbass.
While the owner of the card may not be liable, the charity may still have to pay the fee for payment processing on the fraudulent charges. At a minimum the charity will be put on a higher fee schedule due to an elevated number of fraudulent credit card charges, so they will lose on all legitimate donations in the future.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, the big banks need to be brought to heel.
So they want to do it by stealing money from people.
The people they are stealing the money from are the customers, not the company, banks issue credit cards, not use them.
Sure, the people can dispute the charges, but that doesn't always work, and then who gets screwed, either way, it's not the bank.
Now for all those false charges that get reversed, that's money the charity sort of had, and then had it taken away. That's going to be a real pain in the neck for them and their accountants, and if there's enough of them, it's going to cost them enough money to cause problems. (That's problems for the charities, not the banks.)
Yeah, real well thought out, punish the other victims, even if they aren't too bright, oh, and smack around the charities while you're at it.
Try thinking these things through before going of half cocked.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Sweet, let's all take Gandhi quotes out of context and use them to justify credit card fraud.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Interesting)
The charities will be worse off since the banks will take the money back and then charge the charity a charge back fee. This action could bankrupt some charities.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
Can they donate it Righthaven instead?
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:4, Interesting)
Assuming the jurisdiction of this 'hack' is in the USA, what about donating stolen money to the IRS? Best case -- lower national debt. Worst case -- getting the attention of the government money collectors.
The Scrooges always say... if Warren Buffet thinks he should pay more to the IRS, why not just write the check? Well -- replacing "write a check" with "maintain inferior security of their monetary systems" works. Anonymous can pass along the money for Buffet and the Scrooges in kind!
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:4, Insightful)
Ever heard of the civil rights movement? They cause change without ousting politicians or using force. It's called civil disobedience, and it's proved effective time and time again. By making ourselves heard (me included) Occupy is waking people up from their fantasy land where government and corporations aren't screwing us. When people see how crazy the 1% gets when their power and money is threatened, they will stop being passive and hopeful, and start taking action.
Then, then numbers will grow. The more people they harm, the more will rise up to take their place. Take action and do something YOURSELF, or you have no right to judge those of us who are. Occupy, as well as anon are fighting for you and everyone else. It's not about taking sides, it's about doing whats right for everyones benefit.
Occupy is going to get republicans elected ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Ever heard of the civil rights movement? They cause change without ousting politicians or using force. It's called civil disobedience, and it's proved effective time and time again.
You have it exactly backwards. The civil rights movement succeeded when *voters* decided it would be an electoral issue. The viet nam war ended when *voters* decided it would be an electoral issue, and that decision was made when their lives were affected (increased casualties hitting the middle class) not because of radical anti-war protesters. The true currency of politics are votes not money, money is only useful when the voters are indifferent.
By making ourselves heard (me included) Occupy is waking people up from their fantasy land where government and corporations aren't screwing us.
All Occupy is on a path to do is create a perception of civil unrest and scare the swing voters into going republican, just like the radical anti-war protesters did during the viet nam war resulting in getting nixon elected. Occupy needs to realize that "camping" is going to backfire. Show up, protest, yell and shout, day or night, but when you tire go home or get a room ... repeat as necessary. The more the focus is on "camping" the more the middle will feel that Occupy does not represent them. Polls are showing that this is already happening. In the minds of many Occupy is looking more and more like the "professional protesters" that show up at G20, World Bank, and other meetings. Continue on this path if you wish to waste a great opportunity.
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The true currency of politics are votes not money, money is only useful when the voters are indifferent.
But isn't that just the problem? Voters *are* indifferent, because the choices they have are _all_ bad. Or they are naive and ignorant and hoping the republican they vote for will make them less poor. Or democrat for that matter.
You see, the problem is bigger than just politics. It's society itself that needs to change. Voting for 'the right' president or governor or what have you might help a bit, but it's not enough.
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If society doesn't want to change who are you to tell it it should? Society is people , not mindless robots.
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There is not a perception of civil unrest, there is actual civil unrest. So what if swing voters get scared? They weren't going to vote for change anyway. Voting Obama is no better for the 99% than voting Republican is.
And yes, the occupy protesters look like the people who show up at G20, World Bank, etc meetings because they are the same people, and they've been right all along. The people on the streets on NYC, Seattle, Toronto are now, and have always been better people doing better things than the
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
Civil disobedience my ass.
There's NOTHING civil about stealing someone's money.
Remember, this money isn't replaced in a person's account the second they report a theft. It's usually 7-10 business days (read 2 weeks).
So if your account is drained around rent/bill-pay time, are you prepared live without access to your money for 2 weeks?
Most of the "other 99%" simply ARE NOT. And that's who this bullshit is going to hurt.
This is theft, plain and simple.
The little guy whose money is stolen is hurt.
The banks have to do more work because of this, raising fees.
The places that get graced with the stolen windfall get screwed when that money gets charged back.
All so that these spineless script-kiddies can have their moment on the news and imagine themselves to be "1337 H@x0rz".
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Remember, this money isn't replaced in a person's account the second they report a theft. It's usually 7-10 business days (read 2 weeks).
When a retailer accidentally put a credit card purchase through twice and hence double billed my account it actually would have taken 11 weeks for them to refund the money if the bank had done it. In the end I managed to get the retailer to refund the transaction more quickly but the bank take ages to refund fraudulent transactions.
Re:Ready, fire, aim (Score:5, Insightful)
On one hand it causes losses to the banks on the other it pisses of their customers and push them to find safer alternatives.
No. It just pisses off the customers. Because the banks aren't to blame for a bunch of malicious, thieving jackasses pretending to be revolutionaries. While the customers are UPSET with the banks, the people they're going to be pissed off at are the thieves themselves.
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Wait, you store your actual cash inside a credit account?
The issue is that many banks provide credit-backed (Visa, MC, etc) debit cards that are tied directly to one's checking/savings account. If that number gets lifted then yes, the money is drawn directly from the account in question. Granted, only an idiot would use their debit card in a way that exposes them to fraud like this, but it's not a matter of disputing a pending bill - that money is gone, and does not come back until an investigation is completed. I doubt that Anonymous cares enough to differentiat
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The civil rights movement had a clear message: people should not be denied opportunities that everyone else has simply because their skin is a different color. The protests were used to demonstrate how bad things really were - people were refused lunch service because they were black, people couldn't decide where to sit on a bus because they were black, etc. The protests appealed to peoples basic sense of decency, and it did not take long before they expressed their opinions as votes and change was made.
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Ah, now it's $100k, eh? The definition of "rich" really keeps coming down. When Obama started his class warfare schtick, it was over a quarter million or something, then it was $200k, now it's apparently $100k....
Who the hell are you to decide when someone makes too much money and should pay more? In your infinite wisdom, are you adjusting for cost of living per geographical area? How about inflation? Seems as inflation increases, your standard keeps getting lower. How DOES that work anyway? Is there a form
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This is absolutely false for the US and every other civilized country on the planet. Sure the military could kill a lot of people but massive human wave attacks launched by those willing to die for their beliefs can over come the military. Guerilla style attacks are rarely successful in removing a government. In a lot of countries, especially the US, I doubt the soldiers would obey orders to kill their own civilians ind
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So I am not sure why this hacker group would even entertain a pathetic thought of calling themselves Robin Hoods.
Because they have an ego to feed.
I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Insightful)
To simply put it in streetspeak - these people engaged in cash fraud. And they are drinking champagne in wall street. world suffers through their fraud. at this state noone can persuade me that what anonymous doing is wrong.
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, you can. Learn banking math.
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Informative)
No, you really can't. However, certain institutions (the Federal Reserve Bank and other equivalents) can effectively create cash by creating an equal amount of debt, which works much like cash but with a negative value. Then that institution can issue both the cash and the debt to a bank, effectively giving a value of zero. If a bank wants to lend out the new cash it just received, it's still stuck with the equivalent amount of debt to pay back at some point. The bank could make arrangements with other banks to pay back the debt for them, and raise fees to cover the debt, but the debt still exists. There is no non-existent cash, and there is no free money, either.
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Informative)
It's good to see at least few slashdotters are aware of MMT principles. The only beef I have with your post is using the word debt, because even though it is debt in name, it's quite different from microeconomic debt in the way most people understand it. http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=11218 [economicoutlook.net]
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
What I keep wonder about is even though money and dept might be in balance, what about the interest money which is collected ?
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:4, Interesting)
No, you really can't. However, certain institutions (the Federal Reserve Bank and other equivalents) can effectively create cash by creating an equal amount of debt, which works much like cash but with a negative value. Then that institution can issue both the cash and the debt to a bank, effectively giving a value of zero. If a bank wants to lend out the new cash it just received, it's still stuck with the equivalent amount of debt to pay back at some point. The bank could make arrangements with other banks to pay back the debt for them, and raise fees to cover the debt, but the debt still exists. There is no non-existent cash, and there is no free money, either.
I think you are really confused.
Let me ask you this. If the inflation rate is 3% per month and I'm able to secure a 30 year loan from the federal reserve at 0% interest, is the federal reserve not in effect GIVING me free wealth? The answer is an obvious yes. Please learn about rhetorical questions.
Where is this wealth coming from? It's coming from the IDIOTS holding US dollars during that 30 year period, watching the value decrease through the inflation that is created by the zero interest rate federal loans of which they'll never get their hands on.
Those idiots are YOU and I and everyone else in this country who is not a crony of the 1 party system.
Now you might say "well why don't you invest in commodities then? you don't need no stinkin commodities crowding your living space, just buy into the markets and the futures and options."
To which I reply "good Effing luck getting any of your wealth back from the hands of those in wall st"
I've been through this before in other countries. The next step is to declare a bank holiday and freeze people's bank accounts so you can't retrieve your money. Freeze and confiscate their commodities. Freeze wages. Your debts won't be frozen. You will still have to pay your mortgage and your car payments, but your bank account will be frozen. The inflation will keep slicing away at your frozen salaries too. When it's all said and done, the debt of the 1% will be liquidated as it needs to be and the wealth of the 99% will no longer be in their hands.
END THE FED.
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If the inflation rate is 3% per month and I'm able to secure a 30 year loan from the federal reserve at 0% interest, is the federal reserve not in effect GIVING me free wealth?
If you received (for example) $10,000 from the Federal Reserve Bank with no interest, you would still owe $10,000 in 30 years, which with 3% per month inflation, will be worth about what $0.23 is worth today. The original $10,000, if you were to invest it such that it would bring returns equal only to inflation, would eventually be $400 billion, which would be worth what $10,000 is today.
The biggest effect of such inflation is that people whose investments didn't meet or exceed inflation now have worthless
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:4, Informative)
With fractional reserve banking you kind of can ... If you add all the money in bank accounts it will be a higher amount than what the central bank issued. (up 10 times higher with a reserve ratio of 10%)
http://www.khanacademy.org/video/banking-3--fractional-reserve-banking?playlist=Banking+and+Money [khanacademy.org]
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Charity income is normally tied closely to how much income "regular people" have. With regular people losing money, charities will lose money too. I don't see them coming out ahead at all.
The only outcomes from this will be that the banks get some money from the fees associated with the initial transfers and the chargebacks, a bunch of immature Anonymous fans get to think they're doing something good, and the executives and spokespeople who actually know what's going on will complain more about Anonymous, f
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No sir, it's you who needs to learn. You can start with canadian banking here:
http://www.ohcanadamovie.com/ [ohcanadamovie.com]
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Informative)
You can't lend non existent cash. Learn math.
In banking terms, you can. You just overstate your "assets" to say that you have all this valuable stuff lying around that you can liquidate at any time - which means that you can then lend against those assets - which actually gives you more assets.
Where the bankers got caught though was that their overvalued assets started to literally fall apart. By having to write off those assets, the cash pool started drying up. In a effort to curb losses, many bankers and investors started to dump their assets that they knew were shaky at best - which then caused a flood into a market further devaluing anything due to supply and demand.
Where the world got caught though was when the bankers had screwed their own business up to a point where it was going to (and did in some instances) cause entire nations to become effectively bankrupt. The world (governments that is, not the ordinary folk) then had to bail out the banks under the theory of mitigation - where bailing out (through nationalization, or stupendous loans at next to nix interest) a bunch of banks, securities (oh, the irony of that) and fund groups was going to cause less harm then to allow them to crash and kill off retirements, investments and allow that cancer to spread at full speed into the everyday lives of pretty much everyone.
tl;dr - You most certainly can lend cash that you don't have.
Re:I dont see any issues with them. (Score:5, Insightful)
I think in this case, it's just a bunch of short-sighted kids who want to make a difference. They're just going about it the wrong way. I can't really blame them when, despite the efforts of some really intelligent and good people on all sides, you've got movements like the Tea Party trying their absolute best to make everything into a black-and-white, us-versus-them shouting match.
Great (Score:5, Insightful)
They're going to steal money from the middle class to... theoretically... give it to the poor? And this is going to affect the people at the top, who probably don't even have a consumer credit card (and at the very least have people watching them, and charging back any unauthorized transactions), exactly how?
98% of the 99% are getting a little pissed at this bullshit.
Re:Great (Score:4, Insightful)
Well.. they are not stealing from the middle class. That's an assumption. Credit data is going to be used which can possibly cover all the demographics.
Stealing is not going to occur anyways. Anybody with a debit card is highly likely to be protected from unauthorized charges with no damage being done to them, other than the inconvenience of filing a claim. Most banks will issue a provisional credit, especially if they notice it is a large pattern of fraud.
A huge number of charge backs are going to occur, which would create a operational cost burden to the financial institutions. If it is a large scale pattern of fraud too, the charities will not be affected by the charge backs with respect to account suspensions, reputation, etc. Giving the money back will happen obviously. Which, if I recall correctly, most money from merchant accounts is held for a period of time. So those charities will not actually see any of that money in all likelihood.
Furthermore, I am willing to bet that Anonymous will not try large donations on any debit cards. From looking at the bin numbers you should be able to tell the difference and act accordingly. So any middle class person might lose 10-50$. Not likely to push them over the edge. Credit cards will probably be hit for larger amounts, but that is going to be even more protected by fraud prevention and have a much quicker resolution time to the consumer.
The people that will be hit hardest by this are the banks.
Don't get me wrong. Pushing all this inconvenience on regular people is asinine.
That being said, FUCK THE BANKS. Those are the same people that killed the economy with their bullshit, got bailed out from government, failed to live up to their own obligations with the money (namely home loan modifications), and recklessly and ruthlessly sold financial instruments multiple times so home owners had one or more banks after them for foreclosure, used Deeds of Trust to bypass due process, and generally have been ass raping the American Public to the tune of a trillion plus dollars.
Ohhhhh, and not to mention are engaged in a conspiracy to accelerate foreclosures and not work with homeowners because they can make more money with wealthy investors (themselves and their friends) by picking up the properties cheap with government assistance. Do they pay HOA fees or property taxes? Of course not. Fuck that shit. Not only do they refuse to work with people, they fuck over their local communities by failing to pay these fees which local government needs for police, fire, etc.
They are a blight on humanity, and in that regard, I fully support Anonymous sentiment regarding the fact these people need to pay and suffer in some way. I applaud the ends here, but not the means.
My heart bleeds for them in their protected gated communities and luxury yachts. Poor little fucking bankers.
Re:Great (Score:5, Insightful)
The wealth disparity isn't between the middle class and the poor, its between the rich and everyone else. Stealing from the middle class just creates new poor.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Great (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sorry, I don't understand how you think taking money from the middle class and giving it to the poor fixes anything. Corporations and the upper-class have more than enough to be able to bring the poor out of the danger zone and still remain wealthy. The middle class, by and large, did not get there by doing anything other than working their asses off and getting paid salaries proportionate to their work. Whereas the upper class more often than not are getting paid money that is vastly beyond what the rest of society considers appropriate for the work they do. CEO of a company that fired 10,000 people last year and lost $5 billion? Earn a severance package of $100 million. Gamble with other people's money on the market and send $500 billion up in smoke? Get a $2 million bonus.
Re:Great (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Great (Score:5, Interesting)
Most of anonymous is in the middle class (if they own a computer and can spend time hanging out at forums then they're not the super poor). So they should just donate their own cash to charities. Think they'll go for this idea, or they'd rather just steal someone else's money and then brag about it on their ipads?
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I'm sorry, but you're just wrong. The middle class by and large got where they are through hard work, and the last thing they need is to be driven into poverty by terribly thought out "robin hood" campaigns.
Re:Great (Score:5, Informative)
No, you're factually and provably wrong. I suspect that you know this, and are lying in hopes of scaring members of the middle class away from any policies that might fix the distribution of wealth in this country.
The bottom 80% of Americans, a group that includes both the poor and the middle class, owns just 7% of the wealth in the country. Redistributing that 7% evenly among the 250 million people that make up the bottom 80% won't do a damn thing.
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What's wrong with wholesale theft and armed robbery? What do you think protects your property rights in the first place?
Re:Great (Score:4, Insightful)
So you're clearly someone who believes there should be no taxes at all.
How are you planning to finance even a basic and useless Government that does nothing more than provide an army and court system ?
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I'll bite... and exactly what would you advocate to "fix the distribution of wealth in this country"?
For starters, we could tax capital gains (which constitute most of income for the proverbial "1%") at the same progressive rate as we tax wages (which constitute most of income for 99%). It won't reverse the existing distribution, but it will significantly reduce the rate at which it grows, and bring in more money for the budget to solve systemic problems in the economy - perhaps even enough that no further adjustments are needed.
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Re:Great (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, but you think the rich are going to lose money over this?
The insurance companies pay. Guess where that extra money comes from? Yes, it comes from everyone. If the insurance premium goes up for banks. banks go and raise their fees, affecting everyone (especially the poor).
Thinking the rich will be hurt by this is just like thinking a credit card company will be hurt by all the chargebacks.
In fact, this op can go against the very people they're trying to help! If the charities get hit with chargebacks, that's a TON of extra paperwork they have to handle (they are probably not equipped to handle it), plus loss of the money (and maybe a little bit extra transaction fee). So now the charity is out the donation and had to have volunteers deal with the bank rather than work on charitable work.
Even though charities get special rates to handle credit cards (often no transaction fees), the extra paperwork involved still takes time and energy away from doing the charitable work.
This is why I don't like Occupy (Score:5, Informative)
The point is to help the people at the bottom. You know, the ones who are homeless, living on scraps they fish out of the trash of idiots like you who don't give a damn about anybody but yourself.
What the fuck are you on about? I pay my taxes and I donate to charity when I feel like it. I assure you I'm far from the 1% the Occupy people are always talking about (otherwise I wouldn't have a one and a half hour commute, both ways, every day).
This operation is talking about taking money from stolen credit cards and donating it to charity. Let's disect that a bit.
First, you're stealing people's livelihoods. Credit cards are often attached to bank accounts. You could be bankrupting people, or putting them in a state where they can't pay their bills. I have a problem with that from the get-go. But it gets worse.
When the fraudulent transaction goes through, the banks will take an interchange fee [wikipedia.org] averaging about 2% of the transaction value straight from the top before the charity even gets it. So the banks are already laughing their asses off at this plan, since what Occupy thinks is going to hurt them is going to GIVE THEM MONEY.
So when the unfortunate person owning the credit card sees that they've had their money stolen, they're going to try a chargeback. Their bank may refuse this, but especially if it's a credit card, they'll likely get their money back. In the middle of this, the bank will likely take a chargeback fee [wikipedia.org] from the charity since they'd have a hard time taking it from the person who's had their money stolen.
Now, in this circumstance there are likely to be a large number of chargebacks against the charity, which may further increase their liability:
Currently both Visa and Mastercard require all merchants to maintain no more than 1% of dollar volume processed to be chargebacks. If the percentage goes above, there are fines starting at $5000 – $25,000 to the merchant's processing bank and ultimately passed on to the merchant.
All of that money goes to the banks and the credit card companies.
So what's the final score here?
Victim: Either has their money back after losing it for potentially several days, or if they're unfortunate, has simply lost their money entirely.
Charity: Probably doesn't have much extra money after most people chargeback their fraudulent transactions.
Banks: Got around 2% of every single transaction involved here, more in the cases of chargebacks. Stole money from both the target and the charity without being culpable for any of it.
I'd say I was shocked that nobody thought of this, but it completely matches with everything else Occupy has done: sitting on their asses, breaking the law when convenient to them, proposing no actual solutions, and splitting their focus in a million different directions without putting any real effort into a single one.
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Well said. I was thinking the exact same thing. The banks will actually MAKE money of this stupid attempt at activism. I think this proves that smart people aren't smart in every area. This ranks right up there with PETA's recent activities, well, they are actually getting attention and this is so dumb on many levels it leads one to believe anonymous is a 12-year old script-kiddie.
Banks and Credit cards (Score:5, Insightful)
a) In the USA credit card issuers (issuing bank, not the interchange network) are liable for fraudulent transactions, losing 100% of the amount (as the customer will not pay, usually) is a loss to the bank even if they win 2-3% interchange.
b) They will chargeback to charities many of the fraudulent transactions which occur card-not-present (i.e. internet payments), so the charities won't get much or any of it. I don't know if there are any additional fees which may actually hurt the charity.
c) if a particular merchant, like a charity, seems to attract a significant amount of fraud, the issuing banks may start to notice it and block payments from all cardholders, hurting the charity's normal fundraising.
d) if a particular merchant, like a charity, seems to attract a significant amount of fraud, then that charity's bank (acquirer) is likely to drop its credit-card processing agreement, disrupting the charity's normal fundraising. There may even be some penalties if they do not have a sufficiently up-to-date website and on-line fraud detection software/procedures.
I work professionally in some aspect of credit card software (at a tech company and not a bank).
In sum, this proposed action is likely to create some extra work for bank employees, though it will probably not cause financially significant losses as many online transactions (not processing with "Secured by Visa" or MC's similar procedure) can be charged back. Charities are unlikely to benefit. They may be harmed.
Re:This is why I don't like Occupy (Score:5, Insightful)
Well said, but... (Score:3)
Isn't it Anonymous that came up with this ludicrous scheme? Anonymous does not control, own, rule, drive, steer, or otherwise control Occupy. The only thing they have in common is the use of the Guy Fawkes masks.
Probably not that smart (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sure the big donation targets won't mind the hassle of dealing with angry people trying to get their money back... and likely police involvement. That's just what charities need.
The Real Crime (Score:5, Funny)
is bringing up that terrible Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves movie. That's unforgivable.
Re:The Real Crime (Score:5, Funny)
They should have used Men in Tights!
Not the way to do this (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
There are a lot of things wrong with this. First off, for those people whose info gets stolen, they are out money until the banks go through the process of reimbursing them. With the numbers of people that would be affected by this, that could take a while. So, people will be short of cash at a time when they need it most: the holidays.
This is a brilliant plan if they can actually pull it off at a high enough scale. This forces people to NOT spend for the holidays. Big banks (Visa gets a cut everytime you use your credit card!) and retailers like Walmart take a hit.
Re: (Score:3)
This is a brilliant plan if they can actually pull it off at a high enough scale. This forces people to NOT spend for the holidays. Big banks (Visa gets a cut everytime you use your credit card!) and retailers like Walmart take a hit.
Yes, but people should be allowed to make that choice for themselves. People talk about "voting with your wallet" a lot on Slashdot (usually aimed at companies like Sony or music labels), but voting with your wallet only works when the election isn't rigged. If this happens and the banks don't get their cut, they aren't going to change their ways, because they know their depositors weren't the cause of this; they were forced into it. Essentially, this is like the opposition party posting armed thugs outs
Re:Not the way to do this (Score:5, Insightful)
This is Anonymous we're talking about. The same group of pissed-off adolescent-minded individuals who think it's perfectly reasonable to kill the livelihood of thousands of online retailers because MasterCard and PayPal didn't want to risk dealing with WikiLeaks.
The kind of people who participate in Anonymous's activities don't often care about silly things like "consequences". They care about making news, so they can feel like they're a part of something bigger than themselves. They want the good feeling of doing something to improve the world, without any of the hassle involved in actually contributing to improving society.
Sometime over the past few decades, people have forgotten that major cultural changes were preceded by essays, speeches, and persuasive arguments, endorsed by displays of public support. Now, "protesting" has turned into an orgy of destruction and disruption, in the hopes of extorting change.
Re: (Score:3)
Sometime over the past few decades, people have forgotten that major cultural changes were preceded by essays, speeches, and persuasive arguments, endorsed by displays of public support. Now, "protesting" has turned into an orgy of destruction and disruption, in the hopes of extorting change.
Bingo! Somehow, I've noticed a distinct turn away from the written word. We don't have time for it. "Oh, I have to read something? Forget it, I'll go play Angry Birds."
That might just be the people I know, though...this city has that affect upon people.
Re: (Score:3)
It's about actually helping charities (if it were to actually work, which it seems like it might not).
Robin Hood wasn't running for President, in case you forgot the story.
Do you honestly think any (honest) charities out there actually want stolen contributions?
If you want to help someone, ask that *someone* what they need. I'd bet they'd appreciate honest, volunteer IT work more than dishonest funds (that they ultimately can't accept). If that sounds like trash, well, program up a two dollar app and donate the proceeds. There are ways to make an honest contribution to society with l33t hacker sk1LL
Stolen credit cards? (Score:5, Insightful)
So, given the demographic that most often uses credit, they're going to steal from the poor to give to the poor? Except they're not even going to give to the poor, but rather they'll give the stolen funds to people who normally help the poor, thus causing trouble for them. So really, they're going to steal from the poor to harass the people who help the poor. This seems poorly thought out.
If they somehow manage to steal exclusively from millionaires, and if they don't keep a dime for themselves, and if they do it in such a way that it doesn't cause headaches for the charities involved, then fine. More power to them. But somehow I suspect that none of those three criteria will be met.
Re: (Score:3)
No, in my perfect world, they would give up their excess money voluntarily, so that the following generation can enjoy the same privileges that helped them reach their current heights.
In my near perfect world, the government would collect taxes in a sane manner, so that wealthy bankers pay a higher percentage than their secretaries and multi-billion dollar corporations pay at least something.
But in our current world, most of the rich choose to hoard their money, and they have purchased enough senators to en
Oh, this'll be lovely: (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone needs a lesson in credit card merchant agreements.
Wait till the charities they give to start getting their transaction fees raised or processing frozen for astoundingly high chargeback and fraudulent transaction rates. I'm sure they'll really enjoy that.
Big win.
What sucks about this idea... (Score:5, Interesting)
If they send the money to honest charities like Oxfam, Unicef or Médecins Sans Frontières, they will probably just re-credit the transferred money back to the bank. And if they use some less scrupulous charity, well, that charity shouldn't be getting money in the first place. In any case, there's no real win here.
What would be really cool, though, is if Visa (to demonstrate their unbreachable security) set out a Hack-for-Oxfam challenge, in which any money that hackers manage to route to Oxfam would be stay with them and be considered a charitable donation from Visa. It would be great free publicity if the hackers failed, and a very good deed would be done if the hackers succeeded - plus, they could patch the exploited security holes.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Ready, Fire, Aim (Score:4, Interesting)
I think there's ample evidence to conclude that this could very well be an attempt by the DHS or the FBI to create more paper terrorists. You can expect some arrests around the holidays. They're almost stalinist in their punctuality of the trials, whether public or secret.
What about chargebacks? (Score:5, Insightful)
While they're at it (Score:4, Funny)
Send the home addresses of stay-at-home wives of bankers to sexual predators getting out of jail. Since obviously 2 wrongs make a right, might as well go all out.
Robin Hood stole from the Government (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's see Anonymous try that one. Only politicians are legally permitted to do that.
This will only hurt the charities... (Score:4, Interesting)
The only thing this will do is cost charities millions in audits, time, etc and make many lose services they use to collect donations. You know what will happen if a charity receives illicit funds through paypal? Their bank account gets frozen and paypal will in most cases never allow them to use their service again.
If they want to be dicks they should use these attacks through online services that the music/movie industries run / make money from, or big evil online retails like walmart and bestbuy or make payments to other banks customers mortgages / dept.
Kevin Costner? (Score:3)
Prince of Thieves has to be the only Robin Hood story where you're kind of rooting for the sheriff of Notingham.
Re:dumbest. idea. ever (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:They're not really stealing from bank (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They're not really stealing from bank (Score:5, Insightful)
They've been batshit insane since the very start, it only looked like they weren't because they coincidentally attacked evil companies at first.
Re:They're not really stealing from bank (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They're not really stealing from bank (Score:5, Interesting)
Never let your credit card debt be more than your monthly wage. Pay it off in full monthly and get charged 0% interest. It's that easy.
1. You are always one month ahead. You basically have a free month's wages until the day you die.
2. Many cards, like mine, offer 1-2% "cash back". I actually get supermarket points on mine which can be doubled or quadrupled at certain times of the year. It's like getting paid to use the card. Up to 7% sometimes.
3. Profit.
Re: (Score:3)
If you can buy it on credit now, why can't you save up for it and buy it later?
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Rich People Dont Need Credit Cards (Score:5, Insightful)
they have the money to buy shit dumb fucks.
If you're using a credit card as a way to get a loan ... you're doing it wrong. That's what the banks would love for you to do but you can also think for yourself and not play their game the way they would like you to (by being impulsive, undisciplined, not having a plan, and yielding easily to temptations of instant gratification).
As a form of payment credit cards are great -- that means you buy only what you know you can pay off that same month, and unlike cash you enjoy a paper trail and all sorts of fraud protections and the ability to audit and budget and conveniently purchase online. As a loan, credit cards are horrible -- they are designed to give you just enough rope to hang yourself with. That's why when you show responsibility and make all your payments on time, the banks respond by giving you more credit. They are hoping you will finally get in over your head. That's the way they play this game.
That's why so many of the agreements give the bank the ability to increase your interest when you are late on making a payment, because people struggling to make their payments really need more debt right? It's designed to be a hole that becomes increasingly hard to dig yourself out of. The bank makes more profit that way. If you are so poor that you can barely make ends meet, using credit cards for a loan is only going to make your situation worse.
Sure, emergencies (rare, unforeseeable events) do happen, but aside from that you need to live within your means. Nothing else is sustainable. The banks really love when you try to live beyond your means. Remember that debt is the only form of slavery that's still legal.
Re: (Score:3)