> Anti-fraud == verify identity. That card has my whole name on it and the bank has a trail of everything I do with it. MS also now have a verified phone numbe

> Anti-fraud == verify identity. That card has my whole name on it and the bank has a trail of everything I do with it. MS also now have a verified phone number and can see they both come from the same country. > Remember, it is to stop bad actors from using azure services for phishing, tricky things, etc (since a default instance w/ IIS, or any web service will literally be on windows.net.) Nothing prevents me from doing that with a regular credit card. Nothing prevents them from shutting down services/instances that break their ToS. How convenient for them the only way to try out their free offer is to give them the ability to withdraw money from me.