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Ask Slashdot: What Are Anonymous Ways To Pay For Goods and Services?

Posted by BeauHD on from the anonymous-coward dept.

Long-time Slashdot reader mspohr submitted a report a couple of days ago from Richard Stallman via The Guardian, which argues that we should be able to pay for news anonymously. "Online newspapers and magazines have come to depend, for their income, on a system of advertising and surveillance, which is both annoying and unjust... What they ought to do instead is give us a truly anonymous way to pay." In response to that report, an anonymous Slashdot reader writes: There was a recent article posted here on Slashdot about Richard Stallman and his attempt to make paying for online content anonymous. The corollary to that question is: What are the remaining ways to pay for stuff -- in the "real" world and online -- that are truly anonymous? Even cash can be tracked, but what about other methods? Have we completely given up on anonymous payments? No more anonymous/numbered bank accounts, no more pre-paid/virtual bank cards in Europe (just happened recently), for that matter no more prepaid phone numbers (you have to register the number in Europe)? What is left after we had let the politicos run rampant with forced registrations of all payment services?

6 of 212 comments (clear)

  1. Cash... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The only way.

    1. Re:Cash... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You can't function in todays society anonymously

      Nirvana fallacy. There are degrees of anonymity. You fail.

      First all the people who think their lives are so important that people will be lining up to spy on their mundane existence need to get over themselves.

      You're a short-sighted moron.

      First of all, while the probability of a 'normal' person being targeted is low, it's not nonexistent.

      Second, 'normal' people taking measures to protect their anonymity/privacy helps provide cover for those who do truly important work, such as: Journalists, activists, lawyers, dissidents, political opponents, etc. Otherwise, anyone who takes such steps would be immediately suspicious.

      Third, even if an actual human doesn't target you, automated systems might. An automated system might decide to add you to to the no-fly list or similar, for reasons completely incomprehensible to you. As law enforcement automates more and more tasks, mistakes like this will become increasingly common. It's already happened in a few cases that innocent people have ended up on these lists, and that might have been done by humans; imagine how bad faulty software will be.

      Fourth, many people consider privacy and anonymity to be desirable in and of themselves, even if you would never be harassed by the government if you didn't have them. It's none of your business.

  2. I just fax them cash by jfdavis668 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I just fax them cash. I keep it along with the fax confirmation sheet as a evidence that I paid.

  3. Re:the more guns you have, the more likely you are by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Informative

    There are still quite a few relatively easy ways to kill yourself, even without a gun.

    But those ways aren't used nearly as often. and they're not nearly as lethal. Some of the most common means of attempting suicides have a success rate of around 5-10%. Very nearly 70% of all successful suicides are with a firearm. Not the number of attempts mind you, but the number of successes. All those other "relatively easy" ways to commit suicide are very often unsuccessful, and that means those people have a chance to get help. Firearm suicides are successful just about 90% of the time, which means a gun owner having a very bad day might be dead when if they didn't have ready access to a gun, they'd still be alive. And if they're still alive, they are very unlikely to die of suicide later.

    High-gun ownership states have suicide rates just about double that of low-gun ownership states.

    Oh yeah, people who attempt suicide and are unsuccessful are unlikely (less than 10%) to die by suicide later. But since only about 10% of gun-related suicide attempts survive, it's too late for them. Now put all that together for yourself.

    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/m...

    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/m...

    https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/m...

    --
    You are welcome on my lawn.
  4. Cash in a brown paper envelope by Chrisq · · Score: 5, Funny

    Cash in a brown paper envelope. If it's good enough for our politicians then it's good enough for me.

  5. Re:Sexual favors by tehcyder · · Score: 5, Funny

    Barter sexual favors

    Do you have any idea what forum you're on?

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it