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PayPal cuts off Usenet providers, freezing their accounts

by Mark Tyson on 23 November 2012, 13:00

Tags: eBay

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Internet payment processing firm PayPal has decided to cut off services to several major Usenet providers and freeze the funds within their accounts. This new move by PayPal is seen as an extension of its aggressive anti-piracy policy which led to the withdrawal of services from several file-hosting websites earlier this year.

On Tuesday Dutch news site Tweakers reported that five large Usenet resellers were cut off from PayPal services. These include XSUsenet, EasyUsenet, Wondernews and Usenet4U. These companies can no longer take PayPal payments for their services and additionally PayPal has frozen funds within their accounts for at least 180 days.

In July filehosting websites MediaFire, Putlocker and DepositFiles suffered from PayPal’s “Filesharing and newsgroup services” terms and conditions being implemented. A representative from Putlocker told TorrentFreak that “They basically wanted access to the backend to monitor all the files being uploaded, and listing all files of users if they wanted, regardless of the privacy setting that the user might have selected”. The company wouldn’t comply so now have to use other payment processing methods.

How far will PayPal go? There are still some file-hosting and Usenet companies that can accept PayPal payments but it is expected the monetary noose will tighten around more of them in coming months. The file-hosting and Usenet companies seem to be being punished for their user’s activities.

On a related note, I’ve known friends and family who accidentally bought pirated/counterfeit goods on eBay, they then have to go through a long dispute process just to get money back, minus return postage fees. I don’t know of any further outcome from these problems other than the buyer eventually getting money back. It seems like neither the counterfeit seller nor eBay get punished.



HEXUS Forums :: 15 Comments

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The whole ebay/paypal counterfeit thing is mental, my mum bought something that said it was shipped from UK and legit. It was actually fake and shipped from China.

Paypal would only refund if she sent it tracked back to the sender, in China, which was about £50 so almost the price of the item she bought, although somehow they shipped it from China to UK non tracked for about £5.

Paypal are really starting to suck, as too are Ebay!
So they have been happy taking a cut from the profits of these bad evil Usenet providers for years but now its in the public eye that they are up in arms about it roll on bit coins then cause thats what most websites deemed as bad seem to use now.
On a related note, I’ve known friends and family who accidentally bought pirated/counterfeit goods on eBay, they then have to go through a long dispute process just to get money back, minus return postage fees. I don’t know of any further outcome from these problems other than the buyer eventually getting money back. It seems like neither the counterfeit seller nor eBay get punished.

Just proves what a joke the whole piracy thing is. You catch a supplier of pirated goods red handed on a major site and it's you that has to suffer, what happens to the pirate?? Oh he's probably chilling in a mansion somewhere laughing his bum off.
Seems like this is just more pressure from various organisations in order to try and shut down the service.
this is weird, as most companies are there to make a profit, and that type of piracy has little to no impact on their main or subsiduary businesses, they aren't forced to do this by law, so why restrict profits by doing this?

then when you consider the number 1 place in the entire world to buy somethink fake or pirate is ebay it makes even less sense. then when you hear of the lack of action ebay take to address fake and pirate stuff being sold it makes even less sense

i know people who have issues with a few ebay pirates and one known one in particular, but ebay haven't stopped them from selling pirate stuff repeatedly and consistently even though their sales are reported. so perhaps they should start by fixing their own piracy policies before getting involved with anyone elses

btw, i thought sending fake goods was illegal, thus if you were sent fakes you got a refund and was told to destroy the fake as it wouldn't be lawful to send it back. i thought that was ebays policy