I agree that we must be careful with personal information. However I love Paypal for two main reasons. Firstly, it means on all the online websites I purchase from, most of which have Paypal, or I won’t use them, I do NOT have to type in my credit card details. This is a major security plus. It greatly reduces the chance of some scam site getting my credit card details and robbing me of money. I would consider that so important that even if I knew Paypal might release some of my shopping habits it would not particularly worry me.
Secondly, I have several times had issues with sellers being slow or difficult about refunding a faulty product. When I report this to Paypal they always get me my money back ASAP.
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Update: I discovered that when PayPal says one’s account is “limited” that means it’s unusable. PayPal limited my account as I didn’t want to give my date of birth while their terms said they could give my details (including dob) to any company they had a business arrangement with. So I tried to close my account. But PayPal wouldn’t let me do that if my account was limited, ie if I wouldn’t give my dob. So… a standoff. I’ll just keep it as an account I don’t use.
Broadly, I don’t think the PayPal privacy policy is any worse than that of Google or Facebook or Microsoft or Samsung. They’re all into the surveillance capitalism model now with data harvesting, profiling, data trading and targeted ways to influence people. What’s distinctive about PayPal in Australia is that while it’s becoming a financial institution, it doesn’t provide anything like the privacy that the big Australian banks have.
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So you would rather keep an unusable account open with Paypal where they can sell or otherwise distribute your information to other parties, than just give them your DOB and then be able to close the account, which you don’t want to use anyway, and remove all information they have about you.
Doesn’t sound very logical to me.
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Deleting the account doesn’t at all mean they don’t still keep the information on me.
And date of birth is one key way that people get identified. So it’s logical to me.
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The other consideration is they could already have your date of birth…it could be sourced from a number of places which they could have access to…you may have already provided it to them as part if the original account setup. PayPal might be using DoB to verify you are who you say you are based on their own records, to substantiate the account isn’t a fraudulent account.
My date of birth isn’t listed in my visible account info. I somehow doubt I would have given it to them years ago but it’s a long time ago and my memory isn’t perfect. Yes they may have got it from somewhere else. A year ago I would have been able to delete the account without giving them the dob since my account wasn’t limited then. Regulations change !
They could run a check where any past DoB is checked against verifiable records. Where there is a discrepancy or DoB hasn’t been inputted, PayPal then sends out an email requesting DoB. It is a very simple way to check an account isn’t fraudulent.
Being a licenced financial institution, they will have access to a range of records to check any created account isn’t fraudulent or used for money laundering. This could be also done in conjunction with audits by the regulator…where scans are done to find account information which is missing or incorrect. Other financial institutions have been subjected to such audits.
I wouldn’t be assuming they won’t have the details, as it is plausible that they do now and why the email to verify DoB has been sent.
Yes, regulations change, sometimes for the better or worse. Fraudulent accounts can be used by criminals for scamming and money laundering, both which can impact on anyone in the community. Fraudulent accounts and money laundering has been the focus of Austrac for a number of years and they have been more active in taking enforcement action where breaches have been observed.
Your DOB is public record. It is an identfier along with your name.
I don’t understand why you would be so averse to revealing it when it would be known to every Gov department anyway, and freely found through public records.
Yes it would be known to those agencies but I very much doubt they can legally give it out.
What reason do you have to say it is public? Can I go on line and look up some government record if I know a name and get a DOB? Where is that?
Births deaths and marriages registry in your state. And other states. And other countries.
You may have to pay a fee.
Or you can subscribe to companies like Ancestry who have access to the search API’s and get this information for you.
Government departments, doctors and ordinary banks use DOB for identification purposes, not to hound me with targeted advertising or trade data in bulk to other companies so they can do the same. And it terms of DOB being so readily available, I can’t see corporations paying for details from births deaths and marriages or ancestry.com. They want it given to them for free.
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Provided you supply identification you may get a copy of your own birth certificate, in NSW it is three forms, so it is not public.
Who have their own privacy standards and shield the data for those who are living and IIRC some who are deceased back to a certain date. You cannot search for the DOB of a living person on Ancestry. So that isn’t public either.
Other organisations eg Centrelink have strict privacy policies. Some agencies, like the ATO can get your data from them but it is by no means public.
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For family history research you can obtain other persons birth, death, and marriage certificates. Some proof of why is needed and may be time and age sensitive but it is doable.
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Of the living? To anybody who asks? In other words can it be a privacy/security issue.
Almost anyone, yes they can but there are some checks but I haven’t had an issue yet requesting some for some of my family members (extended and close). Things can change I guess but so far no rejections.
Almost any target person’s DOB is available or almost anyone can get the data?
Are any of the targets alive? What checks were required to get their DOB? Who is the provider?
Yes, some were are alive at the time of the requests. I had to provide what my linkage was/is. I’m not saying it is easy as, but it isn’t that difficult as some people may think. Providers were BDM State Govt bodies, and two were British and one Scottish BDM requests.
Who was the provider?
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If someone wanted details of a person it is possible to obtain it if they can show they have authority to obtain it, checks are not always done with those who are giving authority though they are almost always done (for my father in law UK provided it without contacting him, they took that a letter from him as being authority), this means for say Victoria that the person you are obtaining the Certificate about must sign a letter giving that authority or you must show you are authorised without their signature eg EPOA but it may be a contractual authority (eg when you sign a contract that enables the seeker of information to obtain it). Some work contracts are also ones where a person must provide their approval in the contract for checks to be undertaken.
But just as a bit of information in regards to organisations requests for data, in Victoria as an example again:
"The Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria (BDM) keeps comprehensive records and statistics for Victoria.
Organisations may apply to access this data for research. These organisations may include government departments, research organisations, and universities.
We’re happy to consider reasonable data requests on application. Note that the Registrar decides who may access data."
My issue is the deceptive way PayPal gets customers to provide more and more personal information. They don’t state that they are a financial service provider. As my bank is the credit card provider. I called PayPal the person said the Australian legislation requires them to optain the information. In my mind anyone one can say that. When I asked what legislation they were refering to they could not answer and refuse to provide any further information. Stating only no personal details on service.
Unlike a Bank, PayPal will not disclose up fornt all the information they want from you to reinstate their service. Its a step by step process. Something like this. Please provide: Name and email and credit card details which they already had, then click continue. My unserstanding is by clicking continue they would have access to that information even if its not a full submit button.
Next page full address. DOB. drivers licenece number. Click continue. I am still ok at this point.
Next provide a scanned copy of your drivers licence. I opted out at this stage. I don’t know enough about PayPal to provide them with a photo ID that contains my signature.
If I knew up fornt they wanted a copy of my drivers licence I would not have started. I just don’t know enough about PayPal and how secure their information storage is from being hacked.
I called PayPal again and said I would be happy to come to a office and show them my drivers licence. Their said it needs to be done online. I thanked them and hung up.
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