Submission title was changed from "Unknown Worlds faced with $30.000 in chargeback fees from fraudulent purchases" to "Beware Discount Steam Keys".<p>I thought it was interesting for Hacker News people to discuss it based on the merchant angle, not from the point of view of a consumer choosing to buy from a shady discount website, that's why I submitted it with such a title. I think the title change makes the submission that bit less valuable/tailored to the community.
Where do credit card companies NOT make money? The businesses who use them pay a fee on each transaction. Their cardholders pay them interest on the balance of their account and apparently businesses are charged for fraudulent charges, even though it was the credit card company that authorized said charges. How is no one fixing this industry?
Can someone who understands how chargebacks work please explain:<p>1) If this such an obvious case of massive fraud, isn't there any kind of protection for the seller? If they provide proof that the product keys were delivered to the customers, how can customers still arbitrarily have their requested chargebacks accepted?<p>2) Are chargeback fees always on the order of $22? That seems unbelievably high. Is this just a way that credit card operators take advantage of businesses, because they don't have much other choice?<p>I totally understand penalizing businesses for excessive chargeback levels, when it's "widespread" and due to the business's own products.<p>But I don't understand why credit card companies aren't going to work <i>with</i> businesses in case of chargeback fraud, instead of working against them. Do they really have so much monopoly power that they have no incentive to?
It is a real pity banks are externalizing the fraud risk to merchants, who are not in the position to improve security in a meaningful way.<p>This can really be only possible in a monopolistic environment...