[rmoriz]

in Germany, direct debit transcation currently need an account number and a bank id (BLZ). Or BIC/IBAN (see Wikipedia).

There is no validation except some nummerical tests. You can enter the number of some charity or your landlord when doing an order at e.g. Amazon.

To deal with that risk, every bank account holder has the right to chargeback transactions without giving a reason. That's why banks typically keep a lot of the money you invoice for a grace period of approx 6-8 weeks. And companies like Otto have their own credit check companies…

tl;dr if you instantly deliver items or services, direct debit is not safe.

[Luc]

> There is no validation except some nummerical tests. You can enter the number of some charity or your landlord when doing an order at e.g. Amazon.

That is... simply not true. Or perhaps I am misunderstanding what you are saying. There isn't a bank in the EU that will allow you to make a transfer from an account that's not yours (authenticated by whatever means - card readers, digipass, RSA keychain gadgets that display a new number sequence every minute, etc.).

[rmoriz]

direct debit ("Lastschrift") is kind of a reverse transaction. You tell your $own bank to collect the money from an account of your customer at $other bank

[Luc]

Oh right, I see, my mistake. I didn't know Amazon used this. In Belgium it's only used (afaik) by 'trusted' institutions, like utility companies. And as a customer you still need to authorize them the first time.