Slashdot Mirror
VISA Pulls Plug On ePassporte, Porn Webmasters
tsu doh nimh writes "Credit card giant VISA International has suspended its business with ePassporte, an Internet payment system widely used to pay adult Webmasters and a raft of other affiliate programs. A number of adult Webmaster forums are up in arms over the move because many of their funds are now stranded. Visa has been silent on the issue so far, but KrebsOnSecurity.com points to an e-mail from ePassporte founder Christopher Mallick saying the unexpected move by Visa wouldn't strand customers indefinitely. Mallick co-directed Middle Men, a Paramount film released in August that tells the story of his experience building one of the world's first porn site payment processing firms, as well as the Russian mobsters, porn stars and FBI agents he ran into along the way. Interestingly, the speculation so far is that Visa cut ties with ePassporte due to new anti-money laundering restrictions in the Credit Card Act of 2009, which affects prepaid cards and other payment card instruments that can be reloaded with funds at places other than financial institutions."
So if I'm an adult, and I'm a webmaster, how does this affect me? Stop abusing this word.
I'm drinking without drinking alcohol.
I'm gaming without gambling.
My adult media content is not adolescent gratuitousness, but challenging and informative content that requires some life experience to appreciate.
My adult language is educated and domain terminology that children might not understand yet.
It's the source of a lot of click fraud, clickjacking attacks, spam, doorway page websites, etc.
I blame it on Amazon, who first pushed this as a way for ordinary people to "monetize their web site" back in the early 90s.
... paying to have your plug pulled was against the law.
Have gnu, will travel.