Bitpay Announces New Identification Measures

[wry]

I know at least a few of our players use Bitpay and have the Bitpay debit card so I thought this would be of special interest to at least a few of you.

Bitpay announced that they were introducing a new "dashboard" for their users along with a range of identification enhancements.  Starting back on 5 Aug, users would have to produce a photo ID in order to get a refund of $1000+ USD or make to buy Bitcoin or pay a merchant using Bitcoin of $3000 or more.  They are also adding something called a Bitpay ID, modeled on Apple ID, which I guess they think will facilitate payments (since it's easier to pay [email protected] than use a BTC address) though that is just speculation on my part.

On balance, I see this as just another reduction in the privacy offered by using Bitcoin.  After all, I don't think people usually have to show a photo ID to make a large purchase with a credit card, although the last thing I bought that cost more than 3000 USD was probably international airline tickets, and I had to show ID to travel.

So what do you think, big improvement, minor inconvenience, just a bunch of meaningless marketing or something else?

Link to Bitpay blog post:  https://blog.bitpay.com/bitpay-dashboard-id/

[CntryBoy]

I have had a BitPay card for over a year now and have really enjoyed the convenience until recently.  In the last few months, the card has not been able to be used at ATMs to withdraw cash and speaking to their support team they still don't have an idea when this will again be available.  That is very inconvenient for a lot of us I would assume.

But to your question, it really doesn't surprise me that they are enacting these measures.  I suppose if I was making that type of large purchase I would want them to verify my ID so that someone couldn't just randomly use my card if it was ever lost/stolen.

[wry]

On 8/20/2019 at 5:46 PM, CntryBoy said:

the card has not been able to be used at ATMs to withdraw cash

Holy!  Really?  This is super upsetting.  I had no idea their card had been crippled by this technical issue.

I have had a Bitpay card too, and always liked it, but news like this really causes me to lose faith.

As to the OP, it's increasingly obvious they are having to institute regulations that equate bitcoin and cash, so a bummer but maybe not a large disadvantage going forward for BTC.

[torlao]

this is better, for safety measure, now aday hackers are everywhere, we need to be sure that we are not being hack specially online and with money, i agree doing id verification method for every transaction.

[CntryBoy]

1 hour ago, wry said:

I have had a Bitpay card too, and always liked it, but news like this really causes me to lose faith.

Yeah, they said it was disabled for ATM withdraws maybe 3-4 months ago for maintenance or something, but still have not re-enabled it.  I have not used mine much at all since this happened.

[clairevent]

yes i was disabled hope they make it avaialble again more convenient for u if we can use our card. hope its fix soon. i really miss the time when i can withdraw on atm bitpay.

[wry]

3 minutes ago, CntryBoy said:

Yeah, they said it was disabled for ATM withdraws maybe 3-4 months ago for maintenance or something, but still have not re-enabled it.  I have not used mine much at all since this happened.

Wowza!  I got that notification!  I figured it would be offline for like 24 hours, not MONTHS!  Wow, so sad.  Bitpay had better get its act together, that is just insane.  I guess some competition would be good for them!

[Enzo]

That sounds really neat that they're adding their own ID system. I'd much rather send to [email protected] then a standard BTC address like you said.

I wonder how long before that's fairly common.

[CntryBoy]

12 hours ago, wry said:

Wowza!  I got that notification!  I figured it would be offline for like 24 hours, not MONTHS!  Wow, so sad.  Bitpay had better get its act together, that is just insane.  I guess some competition would be good for them!

That was how I originally figured it would go also.  I actually messaged them on Twitter a couple weeks ago to ask about it and they said they will send out an email once it is re-enabled for ATMs.  It has been pretty inconvenient not to be able to convert and withdraw the $$, but can still use it as a debit card.

[wngo123]

Quote

I suppose if I was making that type of large purchase I would want them to verify my ID so that someone couldn't just randomly use my card if it was ever lost/stolen.

haha they don't do that because of that. All that verification is for tax purposes nothing else  Governments go nuts recently, they are totally paranoid and assume that everyone is avoiding tax using bitcoin, they just hate cryptocurrencies because that is the currency they can't control, so at least they want to control who buys/sells it. 

[CntryBoy]

3 hours ago, wngo123 said:

haha they don't do that because of that. All that verification is for tax purposes nothing else  Governments go nuts recently, they are totally paranoid and assume that everyone is avoiding tax using bitcoin, they just hate cryptocurrencies because that is the currency they can't control, so at least they want to control who buys/sells it. 

That is true, the government always trying to find a way to get their cut.

[bmg]

Interesting I have not yet heard of this .  Thank you for the info @wry .  I need to  tell bm about this so he can look in his email to see if Bitpay has sent something about this.

[wry]

On 8/24/2019 at 10:58 PM, CntryBoy said:

That was how I originally figured it would go also.  I actually messaged them on Twitter a couple weeks ago to ask about it and they said they will send out an email once it is re-enabled for ATMs.  It has been pretty inconvenient not to be able to convert and withdraw the $$, but can still use it as a debit card.

Update!  I got a notification that ATM withdrawal functionality was being restored to my Bitpay card.  So I'm so glad it's back to being what it was supposed to be.  I'm amazed it took them so long.

[djonox]

I have a bitpay card and I admit that this information confirms me in the use of my card in the next payment to come

[CntryBoy]

3 hours ago, wry said:

Update!  I got a notification that ATM withdrawal functionality was being restored to my Bitpay card.  So I'm so glad it's back to being what it was supposed to be.  I'm amazed it took them so long.

I got that email notification yesterday as well.  It is about damn time! lol.  It only was down for what?  4 months...

[Vadimkazebr2]

Довольно интересно прочитать было

[mhasandx]

Bitpay banned my country location. gg