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Ask HN: Why Services like Facebook ads/stripe are closing Venezuelan accounts?
Services like Facebook ads/stripe are wrongly closing Venezuelan accounts
Venezuelan users have been reporting that different services such as facebook/instagram ads [1], heroku services [2], stripe atlas [3], sedo [4], and others, have been blocking venezuelan users and terminating accounts due to sactions that they didn't even care to read, the sactions are pretty explicit at targeting only individuals and officials of the government [5] and there is even licences that allow these services to operate [6] and a faq [7] where this is explained
Even kayak.com (and all booking holdings sites) stopped accepting venezuela as a country of origin for flights, (see: https://i.imgur.com/nAouvUB.png) with a learn more link that goes to [5], and it makes no sense at all despite how much we need to buy plane tickets as people is fleeing the country.
So, what's the deal with these services closing their doors to 30million venezuelans when the sactions are targeting a defined list of individuals?
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[1] https://twitter.com/search?q=facebook%20ads%20venezuela&src=typed_query&f=live
[2] https://twitter.com/gonzalezlrjesus/status/1167833470116225025
[3] https://stripe.com/docs/atlas
[4] https://www.sumarium.es/2019/08/06/empresa-alemana-sedo-suspende-todas-las-cuentas-de-venezolanos-por-las-sanciones/
[5] https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Pages/venezuela.aspx
[6] https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Documents/venezuela_gl25.pdf
[7] https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/faqs/Sanctions/Pages/faq_other.aspx#venezuela
- ramphastidae 7y agoA quick Google search says that it has been expanded from specific individuals to a full economic embargo: > Washington has slapped more than 100 current and former Venezuelan officials with sanctions in recent years and has severely restricted Venezuelan oil and gold exports. But Monday’s measures put the country on par with Cuba, Iran, Syria and North Korea as being economically isolated by the United States. > The embargo carves out exceptions for food, clothing and other humanitarian aid being sent to Venezuela. https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article233561902.html https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas...
- firekvz 7y agoyes, to the "goverment of venezuela", not to civilians, also it has a license specific to avoid what is happening: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/Documents/venezuela_gl25.pdf https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/... the date of both documents is the same
- owenmarshall 7y agoMy guess would be that the US companies are entirely unwilling to invest the effort required to implement fine grained blocking; faced with “lose Venezuelan customers” or “be charged with violating US sanctions”, they chose to IP blacklist the country.
- dmix 7y agoLike all policies it must be viewed with a broad perspective as they rarely have an impact limited to the narrow scope of the law itself. Most people don't even try to engage that type of regulatory system so you never hear about the real consequences of most policies like that. Companies that give up before even trying are rarely going to be making much noise about the laws to get people to notice. This is similar to the effects of "chilling speech" that speech restrictions or other indirect policies often generate, which often happens on a far larger scale than those who were actually stopped directly by the law itself. People who never even tried to engage with the new rules just choose not to say anything at all (ie avoiding the subjects or groups of people entirely instead of adapting or continuing to speak within the new framework).
- jessaustin 7y agoThis reminds me of the myth of "loopholes". Gosh we're not sure why these loopholes with which we've filled our laws usually benefit the firms who spend the most lobbying the government! Gosh we could never have predicted that this Byzantine sanctions scheme would hurt the average Venezuelan!
- fauigerzigerk 7y agoIt prohibits "the exportation [...] to or involving the Government of Venezuela". How would you check if a particular export somehow "involves" the Government of Venezuela? Penalties for breach of sanctions have been draconian in recent years. Given such vague language I think these companies are simply not ready to take any risks.
- dhhdhdsbdb 7y agoBecause the upside of continuing to take money from Venezuela is outweighed by the risk that you miss someone specific, or accidentally sell to someone you're not supposed to. Why would these companies, already in hot water federally, risk giving any more ammo to their naysayers?
- qafy 7y agoBingo. These companies don't make enough money off Venezuelans to warrant the risks of providing services there. Basically, it would be more expensive to implement intense enforcement, oversight, and KYC processes for Venezuela than the profit they would make.
- mastazi 7y agoIn addition, in a “planned economy” like that of Venezuela, it may be quite hard to assess who works for the government and who doesn’t (and I suppose that in many cases the answer would be “it’s complicated” anyway).
- doctorpangloss 7y agoI personally support raising awareness of the suffering of innocent Venezuelans and how tech companies are exacerbating that suffering. It would be interesting to see which employees of be tech companies will die on the hill of protecting talented, industrious Venezuelans using American web services to thrive in a very oppressive economy. Conversely, when it's something abstract, like a machine learning research program that barely works or a search engine that doesn't exist yet and that nobody will use, people are ready to make careers out of talking to the press.
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago> how tech companies are exacerbating that suffering. Can you expand a bit on how (say) Instagram ads are responsible for suffering in Venezuela?
- scandox 7y agoWell as indicated in the comment if they are "using American web services to thrive in a very oppressive economy" and those services cut them off because they can't be bothered to discriminate then they are potentially harming those person's livelihoods.
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y agoSo it's the lack of services that's causing suffering, not the services themselves? That makes more sense, but then your protests should be directed at the US government, which created the sanctions.
- CameronNemo 7y agoAgree, and the service providers are fairly supportive stakeholders. But is a small group of entrepreneurs in Venezeuala and tech companies going to change the administration's policy on Venezuela? I doubt it.
- scandox 7y ago
- einpoklum 7y ago> Why Services like Facebook ads/stripe are closing Venezuelan accounts? Because Facebook's users are not its clients, but rather its raw material. In fact, one wonders if even minor advertisers aren't more important as sources of data than of revenue. So, Facebook does not feel obligated to serve (if it can all be said to serve) the people of Venezuela. > So, what's the deal with these services closing their doors to 30million venezuelans when the sactions are targeting a defined list of individuals? Perhaps it's virtue signaling to US politicians and deep-state officials to indicate their loyalty.
- readhn 7y agoto understand better American external business and political policies i highly recommend reading this book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Q67L00/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Q67L00/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?... It will explain a lot of the events that are happening today and that already happened