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Go to Privacy.com. Register and give your real credit card. Don't get the $10/month subscription for "real" privacy, unless you really don't want a record of yo

Go to Privacy.com. Register and give your real credit card. Don't get the $10/month subscription for "real" privacy, unless you really don't want a record of your purchases. Now when you "subscribe" to WhizBang online, go to Privacy and create a special credit card just for WhizBang. Give WhizBang a fake name and address as well, and don't use your "regular" email. Create some spares on ProtonMail or some other low-friction service. When WhizBang goes to verify your credit card, your fake name & address are not checked. You can give them whatever you want. Your purchase will appear on your regular credit card records. If you want Privacy to use a fake seller, you have to pay for that. When you want to cancel WhizBang, you just close their credit card. They will get a Decline when they go to charge it, and they'll eventually cancel you. You can go through their official cancellation process, if you want to. This works. It's what I do.

notimetorelax 4y ago
I’ve done something similar in Germany, ended up getting a bill after 6 months of missed payments and a nice letter from a lawyer.
- michaelmcdonald 4y ago
  How did they get your contact information?
  - hatware 4y ago
    You think Germans have privacy?
- UIUC_06 4y ago
  Echoing the other responder: if you use a VPN, and don't give your real name & address, how are they going to find you?
  - infogulch 4y ago
    If privacy.com gets a subpoena from a court, do you think they would just ignore it, or would they dutifully hand over any details of whoever owned that credit card?
  - brnt 4y ago
    That is illegal and depending on the type of service not possible. A delivered and received email constitutes due notice in many European countries (perhaps not all, not sure), which is likely to reach you. But if it is possible, I guess they couldn't, unless they are very determined and manage to force your VPN or CC issuer to disclose.
    - UIUC_06 4y ago
      Proton VPN is based in Switzerland, so good luck with that.
      - cinntaile 4y ago
        That doesn't really mean much. You're better off having a VPN in an "enemy" state if you don't want them to give out your info.
  - makeitdouble 4y ago
    To note, in EU most sites will have strong verification of your credit cards (at least since last year) Looking at their site, privacy.com doesn't seem to handle 3DSecure or any other DSP2 level of authentication. Has anyone recently succeeded making payments with that in the EU ? Of course if you give your actual credit card number/CVV etc. but with a fake name it will get refused by your issuer.
- brnt 4y ago
  Yes. Apparently this works differently in the US, but in any European country the ability to deduct currency is not governing the existence of an obligation of payment. That is determined by the (implicit) contract you agree to when subscribing to the service/product.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > this works differently in the US No, it’s the same here. If you signed up with fake credentials with the intention of breaching the contract, it could be fraud.
    - UIUC_06 4y ago
      I'm waiting to see someone get prosecuted for this "fraud": Q: So, Mr. Defendant, when you signed up for this service, did you intend to pay? A: Yes Q: And did you pay? A: Yes Q: But eventually you cancelled the credit card? A: Yes Q: And why did you do that? A: I was tired of the service, and they made it almost impossible to cancel. At that point, the prosecution drops the case. But hey, if you want to keep paying for a shitty service you don't want anymore because you can't jump through all their hoops... well, you do you.
      - brnt 4y ago
        At least in Europe, these sorts of dark patterns are very much illegal and I've never seen them in the wild (from Europe based businesses).
        morelisp 4y ago
        Prior to this year, German consumer contracts were even worse than American ones. Three years was the normal, with three month notice periods, limited cancellation windows, no prorated refunds, and just as many dark patterns.
        brnt 4y ago
mediaman 4y ago
To those arguing that legions of lawyers are going to track you down and sue you: Yes, in many jurisdictions, including the US, canceling your credit card does not change your obligation to pay. (Imagine buying a $10,000 physical product and the seller forgets to charge until the day after delivery, and you've canceled the card. You're not getting out of that.) However, there is substantial friction in the American legal system. Of course, if they can find you, they will send a threatening form letter from a lawyer. If you're not experienced with the legal system, this seems scary. But: big whoop. It costs $5k-20k to fully pursue a contractual claim. Nobody does this for small consumer purchases. (They will send you to collections, if they know your identity, though. But if they don't have good ID, they can't even attach to your credit score.) Nobody is going to send a subpoena for your $15/mo subscription on a dead credit card. These concerns are all frivolous and irrelevant for 99% of consumer purchases that charge in the tens of dollars per month. In the American legal system, it is important to distinguish between what is possible versus what is practical. And exploit that difference whenever you can.
- greggman3 4y ago
  > And exploit that difference whenever you can. no thank you. I'd rather live in a world where we try to make it better not race to the bottom
  - collegeburner 4y ago
    it seems kinda unfair to look at cases where companies pull shady shit around preventing cancellation, hiding the options, making people spend an hour on the phone then blame the consumer for a "race to the bottom" when they use a workaround to make cancelling the flip of a switch (like it should be).
    - colejohnson66 4y ago
      No one is saying Privacy.com like methods are, for lack of a better word, wrong. Go ahead and fight unethical behavior with your own unethical behavior. The concern is that, despite unethical behavior being legal, you being unethical back doesn’t void the contract.
bin_bash 4y ago
it doesn't always work though. Some companies can detect if you're using temporary credit cards and won't let the txn go through. Frustratingly it's often the ones that I would like to use it with the most. I am curious if the card #s I can get directly from Citi might work but haven't tested it out. Those are a pain to generate compared to privacy.com though.
- UIUC_06 4y ago
  Interesting, I haven't seen that. I know they can detect that you're on a VPN; at least, one of the popular ones. I'm not sure about obscure VPN services.
- spdustin 4y ago
  The first 6–8 digits of a credit card number represent the issuer (IIN, see [0]). Merchants can perform a lookup of those first few digits to their own denylist. Citi’s IIN for temporary cards should (in theory) be the same IIN used to issue non-temporary ones. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_7812 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_7812
nyanpasu64 4y ago
One great feature of Privacy.com is that you can use pseudonyms rather than your legal name for making purchases. One "failure" mode I've encountered (twice!) is that if you accidentally reuse an old credit card account with a second service (eg. if you accidentally created a card for "donations" and use it at two different websites, or you create one for Ko-Fi or similar and it gets charged by multiple different "merchants" under the same service), the second transaction will fail. You'll get an email telling you the transaction was declined, but if you don't have email notifications enabled, it can get quite confusing why the payment isn't going through.
djbusby 4y ago
This won't work for some agreements. Some have a legally binding duration, an arcane process to follow to cancel and legal teams to enforce this. However, they make good care to know the real identity of they buyer, so you'll (mostly) be aware you're getting into that hot water.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
atmartins 4y ago
I've been using relay.firefox.com for masking my email. I even pay the $1 per month because it's so convenient.
ornornor 4y ago
> Privacy.com Would you know if it works with credit cards not from the US? How does it deal with transactions in other currencies?
- kiicia 4y ago
  afaik service is us only, it requires you to have card from us bank
novaleaf 4y ago
Silent canceling of cards is evil. Just because it's easy and unenforceable doesn't mean that it's ethical.
- UIUC_06 4y ago
  It's no more evil than paying cash and making them ASK you to renew. Designing the service as a roach motel is what's evil.
- kiicia 4y ago
  but deliberately obfuscating way to cancel service thus incurring unnecessary cost for consumer is ethical?
b33j0r 4y ago
It takes true genius to come up with a scheme so clever that opportunity cost becomes irrelevant. I can’t classify this one. Kinda sounds like an IRC wire fraud joke that some kid actually tried. I stopped pirating stuff as soon as they would sell it to me, but it was because downloading music was a full-time job and I had stuff to do
NetOpWibby 4y ago
I’ve done this with Vivint and New York Times. I will continue to do this for businesses that wanna try evil subscription cancellations.
sizzle 4y ago
I generate free virtual cards with the Capital One Eno chrome browser extension Works great and you can set a date for it to lock itself after to block charges, they even suggest it as a use case for stopping trials from charging you, etc. It generates a card per website and you can replace it as many times as you want all for free. Anyone else using this awesome service?
- ayberk 4y ago
  I do and I love it! (except it stopped working on Safari and Firefox for some reason)

notimetorelax 4y ago

I’ve done something similar in Germany, ended up getting a bill after 6 months of missed payments and a nice letter from a lawyer.

michaelmcdonald 4y ago
How did they get your contact information?
- hatware 4y ago
  You think Germans have privacy?
UIUC_06 4y ago
Echoing the other responder: if you use a VPN, and don't give your real name & address, how are they going to find you?
- infogulch 4y ago
  If privacy.com gets a subpoena from a court, do you think they would just ignore it, or would they dutifully hand over any details of whoever owned that credit card?
- brnt 4y ago
  That is illegal and depending on the type of service not possible. A delivered and received email constitutes due notice in many European countries (perhaps not all, not sure), which is likely to reach you. But if it is possible, I guess they couldn't, unless they are very determined and manage to force your VPN or CC issuer to disclose.
  - UIUC_06 4y ago
    Proton VPN is based in Switzerland, so good luck with that.
    - cinntaile 4y ago
      That doesn't really mean much. You're better off having a VPN in an "enemy" state if you don't want them to give out your info.
- makeitdouble 4y ago
  To note, in EU most sites will have strong verification of your credit cards (at least since last year) Looking at their site, privacy.com doesn't seem to handle 3DSecure or any other DSP2 level of authentication. Has anyone recently succeeded making payments with that in the EU ? Of course if you give your actual credit card number/CVV etc. but with a fake name it will get refused by your issuer.
brnt 4y ago
Yes. Apparently this works differently in the US, but in any European country the ability to deduct currency is not governing the existence of an obligation of payment. That is determined by the (implicit) contract you agree to when subscribing to the service/product.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > this works differently in the US No, it’s the same here. If you signed up with fake credentials with the intention of breaching the contract, it could be fraud.
  - UIUC_06 4y ago
    I'm waiting to see someone get prosecuted for this "fraud": Q: So, Mr. Defendant, when you signed up for this service, did you intend to pay? A: Yes Q: And did you pay? A: Yes Q: But eventually you cancelled the credit card? A: Yes Q: And why did you do that? A: I was tired of the service, and they made it almost impossible to cancel. At that point, the prosecution drops the case. But hey, if you want to keep paying for a shitty service you don't want anymore because you can't jump through all their hoops... well, you do you.
    - brnt 4y ago
      At least in Europe, these sorts of dark patterns are very much illegal and I've never seen them in the wild (from Europe based businesses).
      - morelisp 4y ago
        Prior to this year, German consumer contracts were even worse than American ones. Three years was the normal, with three month notice periods, limited cancellation windows, no prorated refunds, and just as many dark patterns.
        brnt 4y ago

mediaman 4y ago

To those arguing that legions of lawyers are going to track you down and sue you: Yes, in many jurisdictions, including the US, canceling your credit card does not change your obligation to pay. (Imagine buying a $10,000 physical product and the seller forgets to charge until the day after delivery, and you've canceled the card. You're not getting out of that.) However, there is substantial friction in the American legal system. Of course, if they can find you, they will send a threatening form letter from a lawyer. If you're not experienced with the legal system, this seems scary. But: big whoop. It costs $5k-20k to fully pursue a contractual claim. Nobody does this for small consumer purchases. (They will send you to collections, if they know your identity, though. But if they don't have good ID, they can't even attach to your credit score.) Nobody is going to send a subpoena for your $15/mo subscription on a dead credit card. These concerns are all frivolous and irrelevant for 99% of consumer purchases that charge in the tens of dollars per month. In the American legal system, it is important to distinguish between what is possible versus what is practical. And exploit that difference whenever you can.

greggman3 4y ago
> And exploit that difference whenever you can. no thank you. I'd rather live in a world where we try to make it better not race to the bottom
- collegeburner 4y ago
  it seems kinda unfair to look at cases where companies pull shady shit around preventing cancellation, hiding the options, making people spend an hour on the phone then blame the consumer for a "race to the bottom" when they use a workaround to make cancelling the flip of a switch (like it should be).
  - colejohnson66 4y ago
    No one is saying Privacy.com like methods are, for lack of a better word, wrong. Go ahead and fight unethical behavior with your own unethical behavior. The concern is that, despite unethical behavior being legal, you being unethical back doesn’t void the contract.

bin_bash 4y ago

it doesn't always work though. Some companies can detect if you're using temporary credit cards and won't let the txn go through. Frustratingly it's often the ones that I would like to use it with the most. I am curious if the card #s I can get directly from Citi might work but haven't tested it out. Those are a pain to generate compared to privacy.com though.

UIUC_06 4y ago
Interesting, I haven't seen that. I know they can detect that you're on a VPN; at least, one of the popular ones. I'm not sure about obscure VPN services.
spdustin 4y ago
The first 6–8 digits of a credit card number represent the issuer (IIN, see [0]). Merchants can perform a lookup of those first few digits to their own denylist. Citi’s IIN for temporary cards should (in theory) be the same IIN used to issue non-temporary ones. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_7812 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_7812

nyanpasu64 4y ago

One great feature of Privacy.com is that you can use pseudonyms rather than your legal name for making purchases. One "failure" mode I've encountered (twice!) is that if you accidentally reuse an old credit card account with a second service (eg. if you accidentally created a card for "donations" and use it at two different websites, or you create one for Ko-Fi or similar and it gets charged by multiple different "merchants" under the same service), the second transaction will fail. You'll get an email telling you the transaction was declined, but if you don't have email notifications enabled, it can get quite confusing why the payment isn't going through.

djbusby 4y ago

This won't work for some agreements. Some have a legally binding duration, an arcane process to follow to cancel and legal teams to enforce this. However, they make good care to know the real identity of they buyer, so you'll (mostly) be aware you're getting into that hot water.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

atmartins 4y ago

I've been using relay.firefox.com for masking my email. I even pay the $1 per month because it's so convenient.

ornornor 4y ago

> Privacy.com Would you know if it works with credit cards not from the US? How does it deal with transactions in other currencies?

kiicia 4y ago
afaik service is us only, it requires you to have card from us bank

novaleaf 4y ago

Silent canceling of cards is evil. Just because it's easy and unenforceable doesn't mean that it's ethical.

UIUC_06 4y ago
It's no more evil than paying cash and making them ASK you to renew. Designing the service as a roach motel is what's evil.
kiicia 4y ago
but deliberately obfuscating way to cancel service thus incurring unnecessary cost for consumer is ethical?

b33j0r 4y ago

It takes true genius to come up with a scheme so clever that opportunity cost becomes irrelevant. I can’t classify this one. Kinda sounds like an IRC wire fraud joke that some kid actually tried. I stopped pirating stuff as soon as they would sell it to me, but it was because downloading music was a full-time job and I had stuff to do

NetOpWibby 4y ago

I’ve done this with Vivint and New York Times. I will continue to do this for businesses that wanna try evil subscription cancellations.

sizzle 4y ago

I generate free virtual cards with the Capital One Eno chrome browser extension Works great and you can set a date for it to lock itself after to block charges, they even suggest it as a use case for stopping trials from charging you, etc. It generates a card per website and you can replace it as many times as you want all for free. Anyone else using this awesome service?

ayberk 4y ago
I do and I love it! (except it stopped working on Safari and Firefox for some reason)