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Reason Suggests DoJ Closing Porn Stars' Bank Accounts

MouseTheLuckyDog (2752443) writes "In a recent story on reason.com it was reported that the DoJ is closing down the bank accounts of porn stars. Not knowing the site I googled around and found another site, the Guardian. The story does not end there. It turns out that this is part of a larger scheme (ironically) called Operation Choke Point. Also reported in a Washington Post article that downplays the practice. According to Cryptocoin news. There are thirty industries the DoJ is now targeteting: Ammunition Sales; Cable Box De-scramblers; Coin Dealers; Credit Card Schemes; Credit Repair Services; Dating Services; Debt Consolidation Scams; Drug Paraphernalia; Escort Services; Firearms Sales; Fireworks Sales; Get Rich Products; Government Grants; Home-Based Charities; Life-Time Guarantees; Life-Time Memberships; Lottery Sales; Mailing Lists/Personal Info; Money Transfer Networks; On-line Gambling; PayDay Loans; Pharmaceutical Sales; Ponzi Schemes; Pornography; Pyramid-Type Sales; Racist Materials; Surveillance Equipment; Telemarketing; Tobacco Sales; and Travel Clubs. But more can be added. (I notice alcohol sales is not on the list)." The Reason article stops short of saying that Choke Point is proven to be the reason for the account closures, but it seems very plausible.

24 of 548 comments (clear)

  1. Pretty chilling honestly by bigmario · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Using DoJ resources to force the closure of accounts belonging to "legal but subjectively undesirable business ventures"? There's no way in hell that can be legal. This is a slippery slope situation and should get folks on both sides of the aisle riled up

    1. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by gweihir · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It is the way to fascism. Just look at historic precedents. Very, very alarming.

      It also means the DoJ is not concerned with "the law" anymore, but just does what those in power want. Not that "the law" was worth a lot before.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    2. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by DoofusOfDeath · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It is the way to fascism. Just look at historic precedents. Very, very alarming.

      It also means the DoJ is not concerned with "the law" anymore, but just does what those in power want. Not that "the law" was worth a lot before.

      Time to leave.

    3. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The constitution is a whitelist of powers the government has, not a blacklist of powers it doesn't. Where in the constitution does it say that the government can arbitrarily seize bank accounts for little to no reason, or seize bank accounts because the person has an occupation that they simply don't like?

    4. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Chilling if true. I can't see evidence that this is happening except for this web site which merely asserts it is happening. Even the guardian article isn't saying accounts are being closed, only that they're sending regulators after businesses that are flagged by the banks. Maybe banks themselves are denying accounts to some people but the connection to DOJ is slippery.

    5. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by visualight · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What I don't understand is why anyone needs to tell a bank what you do for a living. If it's a personal account and you're not doing business through the account why should it be any business of the banks?

      --
      Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
    6. Re:Pretty chilling honestly by Xebikr · · Score: 5, Insightful

      prosecutors are investigating whether third-party processors that route payments for merchants through banks are ignoring signs of fraud to rake in fees from transactions.

      There are legal ways to shutdown companies that are breaking the law. They involve judges and due process and an adversarial system, not extra-legal requests from the DOJ to the payment processors. An order to seize property or force a business closure can be appealed and overturned. What's their recourse here? Sue the payment provider? Sue the DOJ? Can't. No business, no money. This *is* horrible. If they are investigating, they should complete their investigation, and then ask a judge to do something, or have someone arrested.

  2. Re:really??? by gweihir · · Score: 5, Insightful

    These are a threat to national purity, and if you disagree, you can go to one of the soon-to-be-opened concentration camps!

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  3. Well Played, DOJ... by IonOtter · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Pepper the list with plenty of "industries" that the vast majority of people would dearly love to see destroyed, such as pyramid schemes, racist trash and payday loans, but shut down plenty of useful-but-intimidating-to-those-in-power businesses as well.

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    [End Of Line]
  4. Legal by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Not sure why merely doing business in the Ammunition Sales; Coin Dealers; Credit Repair Services; Dating Services; Firearms Sales; Fireworks Sales; Home-Based Charities; Life-Time Guarantees; Life-Time Memberships; Mailing Lists/Personal Info; Money Transfer Networks; On-line Gambling; PayDay Loans; Pharmaceutical Sales; Pornography; Racist Materials; Surveillance Equipment; Telemarketing; Tobacco Sales and Travel Clubs industries or combination thereof should automatically flag ones activies as "questionable". What happened to innocent until proven guilty??

    1. Re:Legal by ultranova · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What happened to innocent until proven guilty??

      Nothing. You're still innocent before the law. It's just that the law no longer rules.

      --

      Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.

  5. BTC by Z34107 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    For all the Ponzi-this, tulips-that that gets posted every time Bitcoin makes the news, this is one of the problems they're trying to solve. A prude at Chase or the DoJ can't close your bank accounts if you have no need of a bank in the first place.

    --
    DATABASE WOW WOW
  6. Re:Right to a Bank Account by Kenja · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Go read the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and get back to us with why you feel it doesn't apply to a bank account.

    --

    "Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
  7. Porn stars and not investment firms by joe_frisch · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Considering that investment firms cost the government HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS OF DOLLARS in bailouts, can they really argue that porn stars are "risky"?

  8. Re:really??? by cbiltcliffe · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Closing the bank accounts of gainfully employed citizens just because they're work in a perfectly legal field that the government doesn't like is justice?

    How the hell are you people still not realizing you're living in a situation worse than Nazi Germany? (Screw Godwin's law. This is a perfectly legitimate comparison.)

    --
    "City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
  9. So, uhh, DOJ guys by russotto · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Do you WANT to create a shadow banking system? Because this is how you do it.

  10. Re:Don't Misunderstand Me... by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I'd believe you if you had just removed "Obama and company". The push towards greater fascism has been a bipartisan effort in our new millenium.

  11. Re:Don't Misunderstand Me... by artor3 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The question is "high risk of what?"

    The answer is credit card fraud. That's what the DOJ is trying to go after here. If you google online ammo suppliers, you get a bunch of sites that look like they haven't been updated since '98. I have no doubt that the companies are perfectly reputable. But they might not have the tightest security when it comes to detecting fraudulent transactions.

    No one is saying that they're engaged in anything illegal. No one is saying they're unstable, fly-by-night businesses. What the DOJ seems to think is that the payment processing companies they do business with might be turning a blind eye to fraud in order to make more money.

  12. Re:really??? by mysidia · · Score: 4, Insightful

    they're work in a perfectly legal field that the government doesn't like is justice?

    No, it's tortious interference with business relationships.

  13. Porn? Really? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

    As if our weekly fun news didn't have enough material for its "US SPECIAL" corner...

    What is it with the US and Porn? I've never seen a country so obsessed about it, and quite frankly any time some sort of report about some sort of sexual freak show or paraphilia, you may rest assured it's about the US.

    Kinda reinforces my theory that the road to sexual perversion is repressing it.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    1. Re:Porn? Really? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Umm... to be honest, no, I can't think of a country right now where it is so terribly easy to ruffle feathers. Seriously, some of the crap that gets people all fired up in the US would not even make people turn their head in any other country.

      Religion? Hell, even in ITALY you can't get people so worked up over it.

      Creationism? Please, anyone mentioning it anywhere outside the US would be looked at as if he's some kind of idiot for believing in that fairy tale.

      Guns? Yeah, have 'em or don't. Next... not so in the US, "from my dead, cold hands"... are you nuts? Who gives a shit about a gun?

      Clinton's blowjob. So he had a blowjob... "But he lied!" Erh... DUH, he's a politician! "But ... TO CONGRESS!" So he lied to a bunch of other politicians... "UNDER OATH!" Yeah, we got that part, again, HE IS A POLITICIAN. He lies. That what he does. Get over it. Fuck, he was still 10 times a better prez than anything we had or anything that came after.

      And let me not start about people pointedly pointing out that the US is a Republic and not a Democracy. That always gives me the giggles, considering that it's a cleptocratic plutocracy, at best.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  14. Article VI + Article III = judicial review by tepples · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The Constitution is the supreme law of the land (Article VI), and federal judges have power to interpret law (Article III). This includes power to interpret laws limiting the power of Congress, or in other words, to declare that Congress broke the law when enacting a particular statute.

  15. Re:Hard to verify by blackpaw · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Obama is far left in what world?

    USA World. Its another planet altogether.

  16. Re:+5 Insightful by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    So apparently you both agree that you're somewhere on the scale of Nazi Germany, and now you're just arguing over the exact point the United States falls?

    I'd say the problem is more the fact you're even on the scale, rather than where on the scale you are.