Checkout Google Checkout at checkout.google.com

[yesthattom]

click here to watch the video

The coolest part is that if a vendor accepts payments via Google Checkout, the vendor is never told your actual credit card number AND they won’t be told your email address (unless you want them to know it).

Comments

[qnetter]

Um, why would I trust Google with that info more than a vendor?

[awfief.livejournal.com]

For one, Google has a (short) history of telling the government to stuff it if they look at records.

But actually, I think it's less an issue of credit card info than it is the e-mail address. If you don't want to give out your credit card number to many vendors but still want to purchase online, you can use PayPal.

With PayPal, your e-mail address is sent to the vendor, even if it's not necessary to complete the transaction (ie, you have to e-mail them something). Many vendors who use PayPal harvest e-mail addresses and send you their monthly (or weekly) newsletter/list of specials.

If you do not trust vendors with your credit card information, why do you have a credit card? In order to use it, you have to give it to a vendor. And no, you don't *need* one, I have a friend who's a security maven who does not have a credit card and yet managed to secure a mortgage.

[qnetter]

For one, Google has a (short) history of telling the government to stuff it if they look at records.

My concern is not the government. (And I believe Google was being entirely self-serving about the amount of work they'd need to do, and decided to make it a PR event. And I'm not even entirely sure that complying with the request would have had any privacy implications at all.)

My concern is about private entities that are not selling me anything having access to the information -- even if it is allegedly to ensure that others don't have to.

If you do not trust vendors with your credit card information, why do you have a credit card? In order to use it, you have to give it to a vendor.

I trust vendors -- I am careful about who I select.

I don't trust middlemen who have no need to capture the information.

[awfief.livejournal.com]

You don't have to trust middlemen. However, like PayPal, Google does not try to convince you they are anything but a middleman. Therefore, Google is providing a service you don't need.

I trust vendors -- I am careful about who I select.

What makes you more concerned about giving your information to someone who's selling you something versus someone who's not?

It's a very good practice to be choosy when selecting vendors. However, you could also be careful about the middleman you select (be it PayPal, Yahoo!, MSN Passport, or Google) and then you don't have to worry about which vendors you can and cannot trust. It will probably save you time in the long run, if you shop online. Researching middlemen instead of EVERY SINGLE vendor you MIGHT buy from seems like a lot less work to me.

Personally, I don't trust anyone. I check my bank and credit card statements at least once a week. I don't e-mail my credit card information out, make sure the connection is encrypted, and don't use my debit card to buy things off the 'net. Mistakes happen. So I have no problem using a credit card, heck I use PayPal, but I don't trust that fraud won't happen. All it takes is one person -- careless or malicious.

In fact, I find middlemen particularly trustworthy, specifically if being a middleman is their only function, like PayPal is. If PayPal shows itself to be untrustworthy with your financial information, they lose their business. Period. PayPal dies.

In an unrelated note, it would have been much less confrontational to say, "Generally I don't trust middlemen, and I'd caution anyone thinking of using this service to check out if Google is trustworthy information."

[qnetter]

What makes you more concerned about giving your information to someone who's selling you something versus someone who's not?

Someone who's not selling me something adds no value. Plus they will, as PayPal has, eventually exert control over the merchans for whom they act as bagman.

It's a very good practice to be choosy when selecting vendors. However, you could also be careful about the middleman you select (be it PayPal, Yahoo!, MSN Passport, or Google) and then you don't have to worry about which vendors you can and cannot trust.

Absurd. If one vendor tries to screw me over, they can only do it to a very limited extent. If a consolidated middleman does it, intentionally or accidentally, they can fuck me seven ways from Sunday.

[qnetter]

In an unrelated note, it would have been much less confrontational to say, "Generally I don't trust middlemen, and I'd caution anyone thinking of using this service to check out if Google is trustworthy information."

But I intend to be confrontational about this. I don't trust Google, don't trust the extent to which so many on the net are brainwashed into the Cult of Google, and have no concerns saying so.

[yesthattom.livejournal.com]

You should ask that question of any "wallet" service. I think awfief made some excellent points about why Google is more trustable.

As far as offering the ability to track past purchases and not give an email address to vendors make it a win-win situation.

[qnetter]

You should ask that question of any "wallet" service.

Which is why I would never use one.

I think awfief made some excellent points about why Google is more trustable.

As I said, not to me -- I'm tired of Google's back-patting over their alleged privacy protection when I believe what they were really saying was "it's too much work to do it and we can look like heroes if we bray about how we didn't." And, again, I see absolutely no reason for them *not* ot turn over unidentified queries.

As far as offering the ability to track past purchases and not give an email address to vendors make it a win-win situation.

Again: I don't see why anyone selling me something should not be able to contact me -- or, at least, have any less right to than a third party like Google.

I would rather deal with the hundred vendors I shop with than one webopolist.

[sexy-susie.livejournal.com]

purevanilla.com is almost the same thing except it's for porn. It's like buying a refillable cash card for porn, so you don't have to give ANYONE your credit card number.

[sfo2lhr.livejournal.com]

My only concern is that if you read the TOS, the list of prohibited goods and services is horrendously long. I don't think PayPal has restrictions like that (although its parent eBay does, for auctions and other sales).

[yesthattom.livejournal.com]

It's easier to remove things from a list than to add them.

[sfo2lhr.livejournal.com]

I wonder about that. In eBay's case, it definitely started small (pretty much just "no illegal stuff") and now is a huge laundry list that includes nearly anything that anyone might be offended by or find objectionable.

I can't think of anything that eBay banned and then relented on, but dozens of things that were permitted and now aren't.

[qnetter]

Au contraire. Lists of restrictions have never grown shorter in this business.

[vasilatos]

I just like the little shopping cart.

[yesthattom.livejournal.com]

Is this Max who I met at Usenix around '89 or so?

[vasilatos]

Yessir.

[yesthattom.livejournal.com]

Wow! Great to reconnect!

How you been?

[vasilatos]

Actually, let's be clear. In 1989, my first name was Alix. But the likelihood that you would have run into me at a Usenix thing is pretty high.

Anyway, things are fine, thanks for asking.

[holzman.livejournal.com]

Too bad about the religious discrimination in the TOS.