8 ms·

This is disgusting. Yes parents should be aware of these things but shifting the burden of locking down every system a child uses when this could be handled at

by notus 7y ago

This is disgusting. Yes parents should be aware of these things but shifting the burden of locking down every system a child uses when this could be handled at the app store or financial processor level is ridiculous. It seems that some of these people are claiming that the game is not distinguishing well between fake and real currency. There are definitely games I've played where this is ambiguous as well. IMO there needs to be a more rigorous opt-in process for different types of apps. You can opt in for automatic purchases for utility type apps but not for game purchases for example and it needs to be off by default. There also needs to be ways for people to get their money back in certain situations. If a child has a cognitive disability of some kind then holding them accountable seems kind of exploitative. Parents can prove these things with documentation and if proven the money should be refunded.

madeofpalk 7y ago
But still though, they gave the kid their credit card. If you don't want your kid to spend £3000 then don't give it to them? Not defending any particular app's behaviour. Without any first hand knowledge, I certainly believe that there are scummy games out there using dubious methods to get people to rack up IAP.
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  > they gave the kid their credit card These systems are set up so you really don’t have much choice, though. My son will come to me and say, “Dad, I have some money from Grandma, can I use it to buy willywhacker 2 for my iPod?” I’ll say, “sure” - then he’ll hand me the $5 he got from Grandma and I’ll type my credit card number into wherever the game expects it to be and try to check the “don’t remember this card for future use” check box (if it’s there and if the game actually honors it). My kids are really good about asking before they make purchases, but a lot of these apps are designed to trick you - that’s how they make profits.
  - JD557 7y ago
    This seems like a nice use case for virtual credit cards with a very strict limit (just create one with $5).
    - commandlinefan 7y ago
      Yeah, there are also gift cards you can buy at the grocery store (for a $5 activation fee!), but I've actually found that a lot of merchants don't accept them - they have some way of telling which credit cards are "unlimited" and which are gift cards and just rejecting the gift cards as "suspected fraud".
    - oposa 7y ago
      There is a lot you can do, but you shouldn't have to. This isn't someone burning down their school. This is the first world becoming the third world in digital. In the third world you always to watch yourself so you don't hurt, scammed or abused with little recourse. So being curious, doing something different or challenging the status quo becomes a liability. Eventually there isn't much development at all, only corruption and people knowing their place. When you buy something in a store with cash in person, after having it shown by an employee, you can still in most cases return the thing at your will. But when some clicks a button moving a few bytes with a digital payment that in reality costs nothing, there is of course nothing that can be done. This industry is just increasingly rubbish. Don't click this, don't open that e-mail and don't answer the phone. You don't know who it is from or who it is going to. Don't have that password, don't type it there, don't have it too long and don't make it too short. We can automate your job, but not authentication. Don't publish that, don't vote like this and don't live here. Know your place. (At least my banks haven't offered virtual cards for many years).
      - hombre_fatal 7y ago
        Well, then the USA was "third world" long before in-app purchases. When you give someone your debit/CC info, they can basically pull infinitely from your account at any point in the future thus you have to remain eternally vigilant because you once gave someone $5. Which you didn't even do. You gave them the key to your account and trusted them to only take $5, that's how crazy our system is. Better financial tools/primitives would have gone a long way to prevent the issue in the article which most Americans don't have. I shouldn't need my bank to hopefully create a "virtual card" feature (it doesn't). It should've been ubiquitous 20+ years ago. This is one reason I use Paypal: I can see a list of organizations authorized to take money out of my account. My bank account and credit cards? I have no fucking idea who might show up next month. Maybe that thing I "canceled" on their website four months ago? Or I use bitcoin because it's basically cash.
  - dom96 7y ago
    Can't you buy him a gift card?
  - kaokien 7y ago
    You can purchase specific amounts for a lot of vendors, take the time to research the product and plan accordingly and many parents will not have these issues. If using the apple App Store it is the easiest I've come across with setting limits, controlling downloads and purchases, you can add funds instantly so your child never has your card number. Unfortunately everyone believes they never have the time, even though these devices are easier then setting up a family PC was in the early 00's
- jbob2000 7y ago
  Compare this to the real world. You are in a store and your child heads to the counter with $3,000 worth of goods. He puts your credit card on the counter. At this point, the clerk would ask if mommy or daddy were around and probably would deny the purchase. But the digital world? Come right up little johnny!
  - pkaye 7y ago
    How to tell the difference between an adult and a kid online assuming the adult gave their credit card to the kid?
    - jbob2000 7y ago
      That’s something for these businesses to figure out. In the real world, we had the advantage of the card holder needing to be present. Maybe the model needs to change to force digital currency purchases to happen outside of the game? That way the purchase is divorced from the play and the parents can still retain control. Or maybe accounts need to be set up in “child mode” by default, which caps spending at $50/month? Or maybe the game rating agencies can be made to mark all games with micro transactions as Mature (since they basically need an adult present at all times to make decisions about the game)
      - VBprogrammer 7y ago
        I don't think that's too much to ask. If I spend more than an extra £10 my phone company will start sending me messages. Plenty of families would be financially crippled by an unexpected £3000 bill.
        jbob2000 7y ago
        Actually, that's a great point. In Canada, we passed legislation that caps the amount a phone company can charge you in a billing period. We ought to do something similar for micro transaction businesses (though I loathe the appearance of a dialog box - "You have reached the daily spending limit as permitted by your jurisdiction")
- robocat 7y ago
  > If you don't want your kid to spend £3000 then don't give it to them? The article said it was a 22 year old with cerebral palsy using his own account (presumably his own credit card).
- falcolas 7y ago
  "Giving your kid the credit card" is as simple as using the credit card once on the device, perhaps for a completely different game (or to buy the game in the first place). There is not necessarily any kind of physical action associated with these transactions.
- fortran77 7y ago
  Some of this is "bad parenting", but games that say they're OK for 3 year olds (like the mini-golf game described in the article) shouldn't make it easy for a 3 year old to spend money. I have less sympathy for the high-school and college kids who did this.
  - nine_k 7y ago
    A three-years-old should not have an ability to spend money using a card, period. Much like a three-years-old should not have an ability to light matches, or push a screwdriver into a power socket, or operate a chainsaw.
    - ska 7y ago
      They aren't using a card though, at least not directly. They are playing a game. It sounds like many games are set up to 1) encourage you to enter account information at some point and 2) not make it obvious when you are going to spend more "real" money. Obviously these situations could be avoided in various ways, but I think it's being pretty hard on parents of young kids to blame them entirely for "falling for" scenarios that are pretty dodgy. Especially if you are a) a technologist of some sort and b) don't have kids, I would really think carefully before deciding the parents are 100% at fault.
      - nine_k 7y ago
        I do have kids, and make abundantly sure that any payments on my kids' devices go through Play / App store (not a card directly), and always require a password. It does not require technical knowledge; both systems clearly show relevant controls at every purchase. I see how being a parent of a young and active kid can be exasperating. But, if anything, it should increase the level of healthy paranoia :)
    - darkpuma 7y ago
      If a three year old came into your hardware store waving his mother's credit card and assured the staff that he had parental permission to buy a chainsaw, would you fire the employee that sold him that chainsaw? Or would you, like the company in question in this article, refuse to respond to phone calls from that confused mother?
- JD557 7y ago
  While I agree that parents should never give their credit card to their kids[1], note that this is not the case in some examples from the article: > It was on his own phone and he managed to [...] enter his own children's bank card details and buy lots of in-game items. > It turned out my wife had left herself logged into Google Play on her old phone that she'd given to our youngest daughter. [1] I'm not sure if this is a cultural thing. At least in my coutry almost no one has a credit card (it's more common to use debit cards + virtual credit cards) so I find the concept of "giving your CC to your child" really weird.
- HenryBemis 7y ago
  I use a "7 accounts setup" for my finances. One of my accounts is labelled "Internet" and has no more than £50-£100 at any given moment. It is the card used for Paypal, Amazon, Spotify, etc. If that card gets compromised I won't lose more than that, and my bank will most likely return the funds (yes even if it's just a Debit Card). If the account runs low then Spotify won't get paid in time and I won't cry about it :) I was inspired by this video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=auzLhKvsxnQ https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=auzLhKvsxnQ I always had multiple accounts but this vid and a discussion with friends (bankers and accountants) helped us all develop (each his own) 7 (or more) accounts setup. Imagine a "Dave Ramsey envelope system", but online.
  - tick_tock_tick 7y ago
    Why would you ever use a debit card over a credit card?
    - amaccuish 7y ago
      Because the use of credit cards over debit cards is pretty much a uniquely american phenomenon.
    - oaw-bct-ar-bamf 7y ago
      Why would you ever use a credit card over a debit card??? With debit you spend the money you own. With credit you take debt. On every single payment. You are taking debt. Only at the end of the month you pay your debt. If you spent too much, (by accident) you now have to pay overdraft interest. With debit you spend the actual money you own. If a purchase (fraudulent or not) exceeds your current balance, the payment won’t process. But that is a good thing. You shouldn’t be buying things you don’t have the money for anyway...
      - gruez 7y ago
        >If a purchase (fraudulent or not) exceeds your current balance, the payment won’t process >But that is a good thing. In case of fraud that's a bad thing because your cash flow is now screwed until the dispute's resolved. What do you do if you have $1000 in the bank, you get a fraudulent charge for $600, and this months rent of $800 is coming up?
- _trampeltier 7y ago
  Gave the credit card .. I don't think the credit card is always save locked away .. I mean I also did steal (not 1000s !!) out of my moms wallet, when I was a child .. just for bubble gum or so .. To take the credit card is easy .. no Pin code .. nothing does protect the card ..
theturtletalks 7y ago
I know Apple asks for Face ID or Touch ID when making in app purchases. This seems like a deterrence, but not sure about Android.
- sdinsn 7y ago
  You can do the same thing on Android. It's not on by default though
- dexterdog 7y ago
  And parents will just put the kid on the touchid or put their card on the kids phone to keep the kid from bothering them a dozen times a day for a tiny purchase.
- yardstick 7y ago
  You can always enter the iTunes password instead of using biometrics. I’ve done that using ApplePay on occasion with my phone.
- ihuman 7y ago
  You can even make it so it sends a request to the parent's phone asking for permission to make a purchase.
davesmith1983 7y ago
I am not defending EA (I think they are scumbags). But I remember kids back in the 90s getting hold of their parents credit card and spending money they didn't have. Everything old is new again ...
- xkcd-sucks 7y ago
  I remember getting my ass kicked for running up a huge 900-number hint-line phone bill on some Lucasarts adventure game
m463 7y ago
A lot of this is due to dark patterns from day zero requiring a payment method to create an apple id and/or itunes account. Apple has since relaxed this requirement, but it is like running a gaultlet to do something like remove your credit card from your account. There are also self-serving weirdnesses - somehow you can set up a child to "request a purchase" from a parent, but you can't set this up if they are 18 with a family account.

by notus 7y ago

madeofpalk 7y ago

But still though, they gave the kid their credit card. If you don't want your kid to spend £3000 then don't give it to them? Not defending any particular app's behaviour. Without any first hand knowledge, I certainly believe that there are scummy games out there using dubious methods to get people to rack up IAP.

commandlinefan 7y ago
> they gave the kid their credit card These systems are set up so you really don’t have much choice, though. My son will come to me and say, “Dad, I have some money from Grandma, can I use it to buy willywhacker 2 for my iPod?” I’ll say, “sure” - then he’ll hand me the $5 he got from Grandma and I’ll type my credit card number into wherever the game expects it to be and try to check the “don’t remember this card for future use” check box (if it’s there and if the game actually honors it). My kids are really good about asking before they make purchases, but a lot of these apps are designed to trick you - that’s how they make profits.
- JD557 7y ago
  This seems like a nice use case for virtual credit cards with a very strict limit (just create one with $5).
  - commandlinefan 7y ago
    Yeah, there are also gift cards you can buy at the grocery store (for a $5 activation fee!), but I've actually found that a lot of merchants don't accept them - they have some way of telling which credit cards are "unlimited" and which are gift cards and just rejecting the gift cards as "suspected fraud".
  - oposa 7y ago
    There is a lot you can do, but you shouldn't have to. This isn't someone burning down their school. This is the first world becoming the third world in digital. In the third world you always to watch yourself so you don't hurt, scammed or abused with little recourse. So being curious, doing something different or challenging the status quo becomes a liability. Eventually there isn't much development at all, only corruption and people knowing their place. When you buy something in a store with cash in person, after having it shown by an employee, you can still in most cases return the thing at your will. But when some clicks a button moving a few bytes with a digital payment that in reality costs nothing, there is of course nothing that can be done. This industry is just increasingly rubbish. Don't click this, don't open that e-mail and don't answer the phone. You don't know who it is from or who it is going to. Don't have that password, don't type it there, don't have it too long and don't make it too short. We can automate your job, but not authentication. Don't publish that, don't vote like this and don't live here. Know your place. (At least my banks haven't offered virtual cards for many years).
    - hombre_fatal 7y ago
      Well, then the USA was "third world" long before in-app purchases. When you give someone your debit/CC info, they can basically pull infinitely from your account at any point in the future thus you have to remain eternally vigilant because you once gave someone $5. Which you didn't even do. You gave them the key to your account and trusted them to only take $5, that's how crazy our system is. Better financial tools/primitives would have gone a long way to prevent the issue in the article which most Americans don't have. I shouldn't need my bank to hopefully create a "virtual card" feature (it doesn't). It should've been ubiquitous 20+ years ago. This is one reason I use Paypal: I can see a list of organizations authorized to take money out of my account. My bank account and credit cards? I have no fucking idea who might show up next month. Maybe that thing I "canceled" on their website four months ago? Or I use bitcoin because it's basically cash.
- dom96 7y ago
  Can't you buy him a gift card?
- kaokien 7y ago
  You can purchase specific amounts for a lot of vendors, take the time to research the product and plan accordingly and many parents will not have these issues. If using the apple App Store it is the easiest I've come across with setting limits, controlling downloads and purchases, you can add funds instantly so your child never has your card number. Unfortunately everyone believes they never have the time, even though these devices are easier then setting up a family PC was in the early 00's
jbob2000 7y ago
Compare this to the real world. You are in a store and your child heads to the counter with $3,000 worth of goods. He puts your credit card on the counter. At this point, the clerk would ask if mommy or daddy were around and probably would deny the purchase. But the digital world? Come right up little johnny!
- pkaye 7y ago
  How to tell the difference between an adult and a kid online assuming the adult gave their credit card to the kid?
  - jbob2000 7y ago
    That’s something for these businesses to figure out. In the real world, we had the advantage of the card holder needing to be present. Maybe the model needs to change to force digital currency purchases to happen outside of the game? That way the purchase is divorced from the play and the parents can still retain control. Or maybe accounts need to be set up in “child mode” by default, which caps spending at $50/month? Or maybe the game rating agencies can be made to mark all games with micro transactions as Mature (since they basically need an adult present at all times to make decisions about the game)
    - VBprogrammer 7y ago
      I don't think that's too much to ask. If I spend more than an extra £10 my phone company will start sending me messages. Plenty of families would be financially crippled by an unexpected £3000 bill.
      - jbob2000 7y ago
        Actually, that's a great point. In Canada, we passed legislation that caps the amount a phone company can charge you in a billing period. We ought to do something similar for micro transaction businesses (though I loathe the appearance of a dialog box - "You have reached the daily spending limit as permitted by your jurisdiction")
robocat 7y ago
> If you don't want your kid to spend £3000 then don't give it to them? The article said it was a 22 year old with cerebral palsy using his own account (presumably his own credit card).
falcolas 7y ago
"Giving your kid the credit card" is as simple as using the credit card once on the device, perhaps for a completely different game (or to buy the game in the first place). There is not necessarily any kind of physical action associated with these transactions.
fortran77 7y ago
Some of this is "bad parenting", but games that say they're OK for 3 year olds (like the mini-golf game described in the article) shouldn't make it easy for a 3 year old to spend money. I have less sympathy for the high-school and college kids who did this.
- nine_k 7y ago
  A three-years-old should not have an ability to spend money using a card, period. Much like a three-years-old should not have an ability to light matches, or push a screwdriver into a power socket, or operate a chainsaw.
  - ska 7y ago
    They aren't using a card though, at least not directly. They are playing a game. It sounds like many games are set up to 1) encourage you to enter account information at some point and 2) not make it obvious when you are going to spend more "real" money. Obviously these situations could be avoided in various ways, but I think it's being pretty hard on parents of young kids to blame them entirely for "falling for" scenarios that are pretty dodgy. Especially if you are a) a technologist of some sort and b) don't have kids, I would really think carefully before deciding the parents are 100% at fault.
    - nine_k 7y ago
      I do have kids, and make abundantly sure that any payments on my kids' devices go through Play / App store (not a card directly), and always require a password. It does not require technical knowledge; both systems clearly show relevant controls at every purchase. I see how being a parent of a young and active kid can be exasperating. But, if anything, it should increase the level of healthy paranoia :)
  - darkpuma 7y ago
    If a three year old came into your hardware store waving his mother's credit card and assured the staff that he had parental permission to buy a chainsaw, would you fire the employee that sold him that chainsaw? Or would you, like the company in question in this article, refuse to respond to phone calls from that confused mother?
JD557 7y ago
While I agree that parents should never give their credit card to their kids[1], note that this is not the case in some examples from the article: > It was on his own phone and he managed to [...] enter his own children's bank card details and buy lots of in-game items. > It turned out my wife had left herself logged into Google Play on her old phone that she'd given to our youngest daughter. [1] I'm not sure if this is a cultural thing. At least in my coutry almost no one has a credit card (it's more common to use debit cards + virtual credit cards) so I find the concept of "giving your CC to your child" really weird.
HenryBemis 7y ago
I use a "7 accounts setup" for my finances. One of my accounts is labelled "Internet" and has no more than £50-£100 at any given moment. It is the card used for Paypal, Amazon, Spotify, etc. If that card gets compromised I won't lose more than that, and my bank will most likely return the funds (yes even if it's just a Debit Card). If the account runs low then Spotify won't get paid in time and I won't cry about it :) I was inspired by this video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=auzLhKvsxnQ https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=auzLhKvsxnQ I always had multiple accounts but this vid and a discussion with friends (bankers and accountants) helped us all develop (each his own) 7 (or more) accounts setup. Imagine a "Dave Ramsey envelope system", but online.
- tick_tock_tick 7y ago
  Why would you ever use a debit card over a credit card?
  - amaccuish 7y ago
    Because the use of credit cards over debit cards is pretty much a uniquely american phenomenon.
  - oaw-bct-ar-bamf 7y ago
    Why would you ever use a credit card over a debit card??? With debit you spend the money you own. With credit you take debt. On every single payment. You are taking debt. Only at the end of the month you pay your debt. If you spent too much, (by accident) you now have to pay overdraft interest. With debit you spend the actual money you own. If a purchase (fraudulent or not) exceeds your current balance, the payment won’t process. But that is a good thing. You shouldn’t be buying things you don’t have the money for anyway...
    - gruez 7y ago
      >If a purchase (fraudulent or not) exceeds your current balance, the payment won’t process >But that is a good thing. In case of fraud that's a bad thing because your cash flow is now screwed until the dispute's resolved. What do you do if you have $1000 in the bank, you get a fraudulent charge for $600, and this months rent of $800 is coming up?
_trampeltier 7y ago
Gave the credit card .. I don't think the credit card is always save locked away .. I mean I also did steal (not 1000s !!) out of my moms wallet, when I was a child .. just for bubble gum or so .. To take the credit card is easy .. no Pin code .. nothing does protect the card ..

theturtletalks 7y ago

I know Apple asks for Face ID or Touch ID when making in app purchases. This seems like a deterrence, but not sure about Android.

sdinsn 7y ago
You can do the same thing on Android. It's not on by default though
dexterdog 7y ago
And parents will just put the kid on the touchid or put their card on the kids phone to keep the kid from bothering them a dozen times a day for a tiny purchase.
yardstick 7y ago
You can always enter the iTunes password instead of using biometrics. I’ve done that using ApplePay on occasion with my phone.
ihuman 7y ago
You can even make it so it sends a request to the parent's phone asking for permission to make a purchase.

davesmith1983 7y ago

I am not defending EA (I think they are scumbags). But I remember kids back in the 90s getting hold of their parents credit card and spending money they didn't have. Everything old is new again ...

xkcd-sucks 7y ago
I remember getting my ass kicked for running up a huge 900-number hint-line phone bill on some Lucasarts adventure game

m463 7y ago

A lot of this is due to dark patterns from day zero requiring a payment method to create an apple id and/or itunes account. Apple has since relaxed this requirement, but it is like running a gaultlet to do something like remove your credit card from your account. There are also self-serving weirdnesses - somehow you can set up a child to "request a purchase" from a parent, but you can't set this up if they are 18 with a family account.