Quote:
Originally Posted by Robbie
KYC is something that BANKS are required to do.
Not porn sites and affiliate accounts.
The OP is correct. It's ridiculous.
I've had to go through this shit over and over with programs (I still promote over a hundred of them).
To tell me that they need my COMPANY PAPERS (listing of officers, incorporation papers, etc.) just to send them traffic and get paid?
It IS bullshit. And yet they do just that.
Demand to know everything about my company.
There are NO laws saying that companies have the right or legal obligation to ask for your companies paperwork in order to pay out your money to you.
Especially in my case where I have a company that is 18 years old, they have my EIN, and they pay out to my business checking account at a United States bank that already did all the KYC (as required by Federal regulations).
I honestly think that it's bad legal advice from lawyers who are over-doing it for these companies.
But if anyone here can show me a law that says my company has to show it's incorporation papers to another corporation just to get paid...please feel free.
Because if that's the case...then you would need to see the car dealerships business incorporation papers in order to pay them for a car. Or McDonalds' incorporation papers to pay them for a hamburger. It's stupid.
It's actually the people PAYING you who would be the ones needing to show where the money came from. Not the person supplying the services to be paid for (the traffic and sales).
In the end...NONE of us are "customers" to these porn sites affiliate programs. We are PARTNERS.
But again...if anyone can show one law or regulation saying that one company has to be able to go over another companies private papers in order to pay out to a Federally regulated bank account in the U.S., please show me.
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You really hit the nail on the head. When I wrote the original post, I did so kind of fast without proofreading. If I had to word things slightly differently, I would. For example, towards the end when I write about the absurdity of having to submit a utility bill, and then I write about how CCBill getting my actual home addres and how that can be used to inflict harm by somebody.
Here's a good way to crystallize the problem with this all. As you point, not only are affiliates not customers, as CCBill pays the affiliate for traffic (which makes CCBill the customer of the affiliate), making KYC/AML arguments absurd, but I would add that there's a fatal flaw embedded into the very requirements and methods to satisfy the test.
Think about what CCBill is saying and asking to be done. And this applies to not just CCBill, but across the board. I could satisfy the KYC/AML test remotely by electronically transmitting a selfie with my passport and a copy of my utility bill. If I can satisfy the test by doing so, anybody who manages to get copies of what I transmit can do the same thing with what I send. It's an inherently hackable test. The very methods used to "authenticate" are causing the proliferation of identity theft.
So it isn't so much about just finding out my home address. It's more about having to submit all of that documentation together (for a senseless purpose), to include a copy of a utility bill. Once I were to transmit that information, I've just needlessly and senselessly transmitted enough for somebody to do the same thing in my name by using what I transmitted. After all, CCBill already has my SSN.
As I was thinking about this more, I was thinking about possible solutions to the fatal flaw embedded within the very test. What are ways people could authenticate in such a way that another person can't expropriate for their own use the documentation submitted? Not that I'm a believer in big brother government, nor do I believe CCBill's excuse for collecting the information makes sense, but at least the system shouldn't be inherently hackable. This means people should be authenticating with something that can't be expropriated for use by another person, such as fingerprints.
It can't be that a person can merely submit a fingerprint card electronically. The fatal flaw isn't the passport, but that a person can authenticate with a selfie (i.e. an electronic photo that can be easily copied and used by somebody else). I would feel more comfortable being required to submit through the mail a physical fingerprint card completed by my local LEO, with a date stamp and an expiration on it. If that was the requirement to satisfy the KYC/AML test, at least it would be much more difficult for a fraudster to steal that and use it themselves. We could even find a way, I'm sure, to allow for real time fingerprint scanning using a USB fingerprint scanner. The key is that it would have to be real time scanning, and not merely submitting photos. In my mind, that would be the only legitimate KYC/AML test. What is going on now is just enabling identity thieves.
Let me also add that the way the current system is operating (between both the KYC/AML and 2257 statutes), it's inviting identity thieves/fraudsters into the adult industry. You want to steal somebody's identity? Start an adult website and buy some 2257 compliant content. Funny that to make such a purchase, one need not "verify" themselves. Or start an affiliate program and demand to see the information of your affiliates in the name of curtailing money laundering. So the real fraud that is now going on is not coming from a person like me who is trying to point out the flaws with the current system. It's the people who are taking advantage of the rules and regulations. As for me, I have no criminal record and no desire to end up with one. I hold a trifecta of licenses that I couldn't hold with a criminal record. But not everybody who gets into the business is guided by the same set of ethics and morals that I am.