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Everything you described is fundamentally a problem with banks not with Plaid. Plaid solves the problem of people wanting to give third-parties access to their

Everything you described is fundamentally a problem with banks not with Plaid. Plaid solves the problem of people wanting to give third-parties access to their financial data. The fact that in some cases it's a kludge to work around this and not secure end-to-end (although I do think Plaid natively supports 2FA now, at least for some banks) is due to the banks not making this easy. At the end of the day people are going to get what they want, and many many many people prefer convenience (in this case, the ability to use third-party services like Truebill, Mint, etc etc) over perfect end-to-end security.

creeble 7y ago
>> At the end of the day people are going to get what they want The end of _that_ day is when all of their credentials are leaked from a data compromise. I would agree that most people prefer convenience to security (and that they are two opposite points on the same line), but people only learn what security means when it's too late.
mbesto 7y ago
> Everything you described is fundamentally a problem with banks not with Plaid. I don't disagree, but banking is not an arena where "creative disruption" that has harmful side effects should be welcomed. The reason you can't send money from one bank to another efficiently in the US but can in the UK is purely due to regulation. Or why there isn't an Open Banking Initiative in the US but there is in the UK. Once again, regulation. The private market isn't making the solution better in this case because their implementation is reckless and potentially harmful.
- jamiequint 7y ago
  > The private market isn't making the solution better in this case because their implementation is reckless and potentially harmful. You could make this same argument about the existence of online banking. At some point utility supercedes risk. Personally, I feel fortunate to live in a society where I am able to make that decision for myself rather than the government making it for me.
  - mbesto 7y ago
    > You could make this same argument about the existence of online banking. How so? If I'm using Wells Fargo and I find out they have a breach, I can happily switch to another bank because they're clearly being incompetent. If a software provider that I'm using uses Plaid and Plaid gets hacked, then my banking data is potentially compromised. The bank has zero control over that, so there is no impetus for me to change banks, yet it's their data that has been compromised. > Personally, I feel fortunate to live in a society where I am able to make that decision for myself rather than the government making it for me. For most things, yes I agree. Do you think it's any coincidence that the banks haven't adopted modern/secure API access even though their consumers demand it? That's not the definition of a free market and is at odds with "having a free choice is better than having the government do it for me".
mac01021 7y ago
I actually don't want to give 3rd parties access to my financial data, but I do because there is no cloudless, desktop application that provides the functionality of Mint & its friends/competitors.

creeble 7y ago

>> At the end of the day people are going to get what they want The end of _that_ day is when all of their credentials are leaked from a data compromise. I would agree that most people prefer convenience to security (and that they are two opposite points on the same line), but people only learn what security means when it's too late.

mbesto 7y ago

> Everything you described is fundamentally a problem with banks not with Plaid. I don't disagree, but banking is not an arena where "creative disruption" that has harmful side effects should be welcomed. The reason you can't send money from one bank to another efficiently in the US but can in the UK is purely due to regulation. Or why there isn't an Open Banking Initiative in the US but there is in the UK. Once again, regulation. The private market isn't making the solution better in this case because their implementation is reckless and potentially harmful.

jamiequint 7y ago
> The private market isn't making the solution better in this case because their implementation is reckless and potentially harmful. You could make this same argument about the existence of online banking. At some point utility supercedes risk. Personally, I feel fortunate to live in a society where I am able to make that decision for myself rather than the government making it for me.
- mbesto 7y ago
  > You could make this same argument about the existence of online banking. How so? If I'm using Wells Fargo and I find out they have a breach, I can happily switch to another bank because they're clearly being incompetent. If a software provider that I'm using uses Plaid and Plaid gets hacked, then my banking data is potentially compromised. The bank has zero control over that, so there is no impetus for me to change banks, yet it's their data that has been compromised. > Personally, I feel fortunate to live in a society where I am able to make that decision for myself rather than the government making it for me. For most things, yes I agree. Do you think it's any coincidence that the banks haven't adopted modern/secure API access even though their consumers demand it? That's not the definition of a free market and is at odds with "having a free choice is better than having the government do it for me".

mac01021 7y ago

I actually don't want to give 3rd parties access to my financial data, but I do because there is no cloudless, desktop application that provides the functionality of Mint & its friends/competitors.