[ocdtrekkie]

Question: What does Twilio do with the profit it does make off those bad actors once it discovers they are bad actors?

Probably my top issue with companies like Google which make a ton of money off of crime is... they keep the money from the crime! That's a perverse incentive to at least do a poor job preventing it.

I remember visiting the Twilio offices when it was still tiny during a Google Glass related thing. I still have the T-shirt.

[jeffiel]

It’s a good question because it goes to the incentives of a company to truly fight the problem vs saying the right things but looking the other way when convenient.

For us, we typically work with customers who are victims of fraud and the first time, we give them advice on how to better protect themselves and then refund them ~ the amount of profit we would have made. Ie we recoup costs but that’s it. For the financially aware, this is bad for our gross margin and profit but we do it to help customers the first time. After that though we expect them do implement some defenses otherwise our incentives aren’t aligned. Now however, we have Fraud Guard rolling out which should prevent much of the fraud in the first place.

There are other forms of bad actors but that’s the most prevalent these days.

[ocdtrekkie]

That's a better answer than I expected, thanks! I agree it definitely makes sense to ensure your customers also have incentives aligned with yours.

[ITB]

You have the CEO of a public company come out to play and address a public post, which is pretty cool! Your attacking style of questioning just makes people like Jeff less likely to engage with the community. You could frame the same question in a more constructive style.

[bornfreddy]

(for the record, I didn't downvote you)

Curious, what in GP's question rubbed you the wrong way? To me it seemed like a legitimate question. I'd actually like to know the answer myself because in the end it always comes down to incentives. But maybe I missed some nuance? (not a native english speaker, obviously)

Anyway, hoping for the answer to the question, and that it is taken in a positive way.

[ocdtrekkie]

I actually don't have a strong issue with Twilio, and I think it's a good question that concerns me about other larger companies which also have problems with bad actors on their platform. It is potentially something that CEO could use as a huge differentiator if they want to as well. It definitely wasn't meant to be attacking in style, and I also wasn't aware this was the CEO. =)

That being said, I'm not a scary individual, I assume I am softballing compared to what a CEO faces day to day.

[AJayWalker]

I didn’t take ocdtrekkie’s question as attacking. How would you have phrased it to be more constructive?

[itsoktocry]

>come out to play

Jeff is the CEO of a public company, and hence works for shareholders.

It's in Jeff's interest to engage with the community, and we are glad he's here. We certainly don't need to tiptoe around delicate sensibilities though...