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by venaoy 4161 days ago
Regarding the advisory letter, it just requires the bank to "investigate". The bank can still conclude the transaction was authorized and deny your claim to cancel the transaction. So it will be your responsibility as a customer to prove that you were not present during the transaction.

Regarding scenario #1, it is irrelevant if the amount is $50 or $1000. My point is, you have no recourse. Credit cards won't protect you from fraud in this case.
1 comments
hurin 4161 days ago
Again. You are incorrect and you don't what you're talking about, banks need to send a written explanation of a denial and in most cases they aren't partial (because usually they aren't the ones paying the refund) - since legally the merchant is responsible for confirming customer identity (it's not the customer that would have to prove they weren't there).

Anyways, debating the effectiveness of consumer fraud-protection is quite beside the point, since Bitcoin offers absolutely no fraud protection and very circumstantial utility (i.e. the ability to make anonymous or pseudo-anonymous payments).

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venaoy 4161 days ago
I know very well what I am talking about. Read for example a credit card agreement from a random bank, say Scotiabank, in the section about fraud:

"If your Password or PIN is used in such a transaction, you will be liable for the full debt, including interest arising from such use" Source: http://www.scotiabank.com/ca/common/pdf/borrowing/revolving_...

In other words, if a thief somehow steals my PIN, I will be liable as a customer. If you still don't believe me, read any of the stories reported by journalists explaining how banks reject fraud claims when the PIN was used: http://mymoneycounselor.com/card-fraud-blame-shift Merchants may be responsible for verifying the customer's identity, but often they don't. This is why credit card fraud is prevalent.

> debating the effectiveness of consumer fraud-protection is quite beside the point

On the contrary, this is important in this debate. You can't use "zero-liability" as a reason why credit cards are superiors to Bitcoin when I prove to you customers are actually held liable in many cases.

Bitcoin can be superior to credit cards, because when the wallet is properly secured (for example a passcode-protected hardware wallet), theft and fraud becomes increasingly unlikely, whereas credit card fraud continues to become a bigger and bigger problem, and banks increasingly shift the liability toward customers as I documented above.

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