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Faxes? Letterheads? To me, those sound almost like the "proof of work" idea behind some blockchain technologies. Essentially: "Prove to us that you're a legitim

Faxes? Letterheads? To me, those sound almost like the "proof of work" idea behind some blockchain technologies. Essentially: "Prove to us that you're a legitimate entity, because clearly you have bothered to set up support for such legacy solutions." Personally, i'd be more comfortable with the modern approach being something more along the lines of: You should put the token that we'll provide you with under your corporate website's page: https://<YOUR_DOMAIN>/.well-known/identity-challenge/<TOKEN> A bit like what is done by Let's Encrypt for providing HTTPS (though there could be additional technical details). Of course, this does almost nothing for the website being compromised, but still feels less nonsensical than using fax and using letterheads and such.

toomanybeersies 5y ago
I think you're missing the point. The bank doesn't want you to prove ownership of a particular asset; they want you to prove that you are "carrying on a business". Owning a website (or a printer, or a truck, or lots of money) doesn't mean you have a business. It's about the nature and purpose of your activities with those assets (or skills). I can add an identity token to my personal website, but that doesn't make it a business any more than putting a saddle on a zebra makes it a horse. This ruling from the Australian Tax Office lays out pretty clearly the defining characteristics of a business [1]. It's probably a bit different in the USA, but I'm sure it's not too dissimilar. [1] https://www.ato.gov.au/law/view/document?docid=TXR/TR20191/NAT/ATO/00001&PiT=20190904000001 https://www.ato.gov.au/law/view/document?docid=TXR/TR20191/N...