Online shopping, privacy and behavior prediction. A rant.

2026-05-05 18:35 UTC

So years ago I made an account on an online shopping platform. I took pains to do it as privately as I could. Shipping address as PO box. Didn’t use real name to sign up. Masked credit card for payment. Etc. I had it for IDK like 6 years? 7 years? I didn’t use it a LOT, but let’s say once a month avg. Over those years I had 100% the best feedback rating. I never caused any prob to anyone. I acted in good faith. Suddenly one day… account canceled. Contacted company. They said send us copy of your gov photo ID. I said how about no? I know it was b/c my account triggered some predictive anti abuse system. Scammers do a lot of what I did. Diff is, I was not a scammer. I just wanted some privacy. Wasn’t even buying anything embarrasing. Just normal shit. I thought since I got 6+ yrs of history, spend like mid 4 digits of $$ total, zero probs, perfect feedback for 6 years, I figured hey maybe I wouldn’t be lumped in. But fuck me sideways. Funny thing is. I had an older acct under my real name. It had LESS total purcahse history. By a lot. I never submitted any ID to create it. It’s still there. It still works. Diff is, it’s tied to my home addy and real name. It didn’t trigger anti-abuse prediction. ANd it is prediction! I never abused anything, and never would. More and more, I can’t participate in the world, if I try to protect myself from data brokers that collect every fucking thing I do. I’m sorry. I just had to rant lol. What is your experience with online shopping, if you try to set it up not tied directly to your name, phone, & home addy?

Replies (5)

@valar@lemmy.ca 2026-05-05 22:45

It’s super frustrating. More and more I run into issues like this even just trying to register an account somewhere with any form of privacy protection. May I ask what you used to mask your CC?

Open ##2046082
@boogiebored@lemmy.world 2026-05-05 23:32

The backlash is coming: fuck 55 factor authentication and ID theft and all this bullshit. I bike up the road and buy what I need. Fuck off internet.

Open ##2047670
@PierceTheBubble@lemmy.ml 2026-05-06 00:43

Probably because of systems like this, which cross reference account details across online stores, to spot discrepancies between provided information, or spot other “suspicious activity”. And mind you, they also consider chargebacks friendly “fraud”, which is absolutely delusional. I personally have no experience to share though, but thought this might be relevant.

Open ##2051480
@floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2026-05-06 11:42

This is KYC. Unfortunately it is legally mandated in many places and has been for a while. It sucks and should be abolished, but currently most companies can’t really avoid it, especially when selling anything is involved, under the guise of “money laundering prevention”

Open ##2077811
@monovergent@lemmy.ml 2026-05-06 17:57

No fun. If I order something that requires a signature, I probably won’t be home at the delivery time to sign the package. So it gets dropped off at the post office, and when I go there to pick it up, they also ask for an ID matching the name on the package. Admittedly, I’ve stopped trying on this end since I order to my actual home address, which would be trivial for any company to trace back to my name. I try to find everything I can in a physical store and pay with cash, the rest is usually niche hobbyist electronics that would never make it to a store. Also used to be that you could go into a physical store, buy a prepaid credit card with cash, then spend it online. But fewer and fewer websites are accepting those prepaid cards.

Open ##2098741