Facebook Introduces Payment System

An anonymous reader writes: Today Facebook announced a new feature for its Messenger services: the ability to send money to friends. The payment system will work by connecting debit cards from Visa or Mastercard — no credit cards, and no bank accounts. The company claims they aren't trying to make money on it, since it'd be such a small business compared to their ad revenue. "Once the $ button is tapped, users simply enter the dollar amount and hit Pay. The money is instantly taken from their debit account and delivered to the recipient's debit account. Facebook never holds the money, though the receiver's bank will usually take a few days to make the funds available as is standard. Both users see a confirmation message detailing the transfer status and time." Facebook says transaction information is encrypted, and users will protect their cards with a dedicated passcode (or fingerprint identification).

Comments

Not credit... so your account stays drained

[mlts]

Great, another ACH debit mechanism, which means that when a fraudster empties a bank account, it stays emptied because there is nowhere the protection present that a credit card has in place.

I would place this on the heap of "run, don't walk away from", also-ran payment standards like CurrenC... avoid at all costs.

Now, if they had used the Visa/MC credit mechanism, things would be different. Fraud wouldn't completely destroy an end user's bank account.

Re:Not credit... so your account stays drained

[nehumanuscrede]

They won't do so because of the CC fees that are involved on a per transaction basis.

IF you're going to be dumb enough to sign up for such a silly service, at least make sure you're using an alternate account with a minimum amount of funds in it so when it does get compromised, it isn't an epic event. Disable overdraft protection, unlink it from your primary accounts.

Overall, it's a bad idea anyway. It's Facebook lol.