7 ms·

How To Accept Bitcoin On Your Website

229 points by barmstrong 14y ago

kragen 14y ago
Hi Brian, cool, congratulations on making it this far! Do you think the several hours latency to the bank account deposit is going to expose people to too much exchange rate volatility?
- wmf 14y ago
  Since Bitcoin is unregulated, if they wanted to I guess Coinbase could lock in exchange rates at any time they choose (e.g. the time of the transaction) and then do the exchange later. Since that effectively shifts the currency risk from the merchant to Coinbase, they could choose to charge extra for such a service.
johnnyjustice 14y ago
Is this a dangerous thing to put on ones website at all?
- yebyen 14y ago
  Dangerous? The only danger is that you might pay 1% fee when sending/converting your earnings back to USD. Also possible that the value of bitcoin tanks overnight, but there are historical charts that show this has not really happened but just once. What kind of danger are you thinking? The exchange could also go under and/or rob you. You should be careful about to whom you give your bank account numbers.
  - tmh88j 14y ago
    >What kind of danger are you thinking? My guess is he's referring to one of the many "dealers" that were hacked and had bitcoins stolen.
    - yebyen 14y ago
      That would fall into the category of exchange going under. Similar risk to cash in the mail, except with cash in the mail there's nothing you can do to protect yourself (or prove that delivery was accepted.)
      - crygin 14y ago
        It's actually somewhat riskier than cash through the mail (which is shockingly reliable), and you have no recourse, unlike the US postal service which is more than happy to insure cash mailings (up to $25k through Registered Mail) and investigate and prosecute fraud.
        yebyen 14y ago
        That was the first danger. How much is the insurance? We were talking about 1% at CoinBase, I think that MtGox was 0.65%, and that's only for buying and selling. Withdrawals are free. Bitcoin-to-bitcoin transfers are (still) free. If it's $20,000 cash in the mail, it weighs about 200g (100 $100's) and to mail it about an hour from here (1 hour 30 minutes by car) Rochester to Buffalo, registered mail with $25,000 insurance, flat rate priority mail envelope is $53. I guess that price is the same across country. OK, so it's actually cheaper to mail cash than to trade bank dollars for bitcoins. I'll get off my pulpit now. (PS: I'm pretty sure you actually have to pay taxes on that cash you received by mail, especially if it's registered and insured, now that it's yours, it's income. Bitcoins on the other hand are not cash. I am a newbie to taxes, but I don't think you would have to pay tax on bitcoin income unless you were actually cashing them out. Maybe capital gains. Any experts?)
        tedunangst 14y ago
        You owe tax on income regardless of the form. If your employer gives you stock, you owe tax based on the stock's value the day you get it. Capital gains (or losses) mostly only applies when you sell the stock, and only to the difference in value. Same deal for bitcoins. Hell, if you're caller #9 and you just won the two week cruise, you're getting a fat tax bill and cruises aren't cash either.
UnFundedHype 14y ago
Now how about a one button way for my users to buy bit coins. Buying bitcoins is an exhausting user experience
- yebyen 14y ago
  You should just ask them to mail you cash. It's about equally reliable, from a buyer's perspective.
  - drivingmenuts 14y ago
    I can spend cash at the corner store if it comes down to it. Bitcoin, not so much.
    - yebyen 14y ago
      Now, there's an argument for greenbacks. McDonalds takes greenbacks. Brb guys... fry cravings.
- kirian 14y ago
  For US users Coinbase is one of the easiest ways to buy bitcoins. Link your bank account like you would with paypal and it's straightforward from there on.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    I would be very hesitant to give a new entrant my bank account information, no matter what they did with it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4703704 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4703704
    - natrius 14y ago
      My PayPal strategy, which I'd reuse for Coinbase et al, is to just create a separate checking account for that with a few clicks. I think the most they can screw me over is one or two overdraft fees before I tell my bank to stop ACH transactions.
ROFISH 14y ago
The button is working on Chrome/Windows but not Firefox/Windows. (Amusingly, it also works in IE9/Windows)
- smithzvk 14y ago
  Also doesn't appear to work in Firefox/Ubuntu.
- barmstrong 14y ago
  Thanks for the bug report! Just pushed out a fix for Firefox. Live in 5 min. Thanks!
kirian 14y ago
Bitcoin merchant services sector is really heating up. Bitpay.com making big news with the recent Wordpress announcement, Walletbit (http://bitcoinmagazine.net/walletbit-launches-bank-transfers-for-merchants-in-europe/ http://bitcoinmagazine.net/walletbit-launches-bank-transfers...) growing and adding more features and now Coinbase joining in. This open competition allowed by the open source nature of Bitcoin is great to see.
viraj_shah 14y ago
Great job Brian. Seems similar to one click Stripe button.
ww520 14y ago
How does refund work with Bitcoin? Since Bitcoin can have big swing, some users might opt to get the refund of bitcoin after a while.
- wmf 14y ago
  Merchants should refund an equivalent value of BTC, not the same amount paid.
  - DrStalker 14y ago
    Why? Serious question, if I get a refund the amount isn't compensated for changes in the Australian dollar. Either the buyer or seller will lose out if the value of bit-coins change, so is there a compelling reason for picking which party that is other than "merchants have the control to give whatever refund amount they want"
    - wmf 14y ago
      Considering that customers generally get to choose whether and when (within a certain window) to ask for a refund, refunding the same amount of BTC gives customers a license to steal.
      - deleted 14y ago
        [deleted]
    - kamkazemoose 14y ago
      The main reason is because bitcoins are volatile. Most currencies are fairly stable, there won't be much fluctuation over the course of a week or month, for however long refunds are valid. This isn't true for bitcoins. Once you pay for something in bitcoins, you are trading those bitcoins for something of similar value at that time. I don't know what the bitcoin exchange rate is right now, so I'm just going to make up some numbers for an example. But say you buy a TV that has a value of $1000 USD. Let's say the current exchange rate is 10 bitcoins to 1 USD. Then you have to pay them 10,000 bitcoins for the TV. Say a month later, you decide you want a refund. So you return the TV. Well the TV still has a value of $1000 USD (ignoring deprecation) so you should get that same value back. If the bitcoin market has skyrocketed, to say 5 bitcoins to 1 usd, then you would get 5000bitcoins back, because those bitcoins have the same value. The merchant isn't acting as a bank to hold onto your coins for you, they are trading you something of value for something else, and if you want a refund, you'll get something of the same value back.
te 14y ago
What is coinbase's strategy re dispute resolution?
javert 14y ago
Suggestion: I found the option "Send to a bitcoin address" to be confusing. I would have expected it to say "Send from a bitcoin address." Upon further reflection, it's clear why I expected that. First, when a user goes through a typical online checkout/payment, they are not concerned about where the money is going to, they are concerned about where it is coming from, i.e., putting their credit card info in. Second, the prior option is "Send using my coinbase account," which reinforces what I was talking about in the other point I just made. For the sake of consistency, both options should be about sending from somewhere, not sending to somewhere. An alternative way to do this would be having the first option say "Send using Coinbase" and the second option be "Send using the Bitcoin network," or something to that effect.
- kirian 14y ago
  Yes, I agree with the above comment, "Pay using bitcoin" or "Send bitcoins" or something like that would be less confusing I think.
- barmstrong 14y ago
  Ok good feedback. While technically it is correct that you are sending to a single bitcoin address (your payment can actually come from multiple bitcoin addresses) I agree it's confusing and the the distinction isn't important to more users. It now reads like this: http://cl.ly/image/2n3Y3F261o1s http://cl.ly/image/2n3Y3F261o1s
  - javert 14y ago
    Sweet, I like it much better that way. Good point that your payment likely would come from multiple addresses, I had overlooked that.
discountgenius 14y ago
Are you working on plugins for integration with existing shopping carts?
e1ven 14y ago
I'd love to transparently accept BTC on a website I'm building, and have the merchant company send me a check every month.. I'm really hesitant to use (and thus implicitly recommend) Coinbase, since they're asking for Bank username/passwords from users. Even thought it's not necessary, it makes these guys really look rather Shady to me, so I'm really reluctant to use their solution. Has anyone else worked with Bitpay or other providers in this space? I'd love to hear how things went for you.
- barmstrong 14y ago
  Founder here - just wanted to clarify that bank username/password is not required, you can also use deposit verification. But glad to hear you're interested in accepting bitcoin. Thanks!
  - clark-kent 14y ago
    I think it is reasonable to remove the bank username/password requirement. All it does is raise red flags for potential users.
frozenport 14y ago
Suggestion 1: Offer to convert user funds to bitcoins (works as an annoying service). So you act as a money proxy. Suggestion 2: Explain what bitcoins are for shopping cart users
- dllthomas 14y ago
  annoying?
- Karunamon 14y ago
  #1 puts you in shaky legal territory at least in the united states, since cash exchange services have a huge litany of regulations.
- tled 14y ago
  I also find it hard to explain to users what and how to use Bitcoin. I'm running a women fashion e-commerce site and most of users are women and non-tech.
kenj0418 14y ago
Great - now we only need a 'Why To Accept Bitcoin On Your Website' article.
- kirian 14y ago
  Some good "Why To Accept Bitcoin" reasons in this article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2012/11/16/whats-your-bitcoin-strategy-wordpress-now-accepts-bitcoin-across-the-planet/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2012/11/16/whats-your...
mtgx 14y ago
What are the limitations regarding the location of the users or merchants, if there are any? Can I send and receive Bitcoin through Coinbase to and from anywhere? I assume the bank thing only works with US banks? I'm not sure about the color of the button. Seems rather dull to me, and might be easily missed. You might want to A/B test that. I like what you're doing, though. An easy to use Paypal-like service is very needed in the Bitcoin world. Wasn't Reddit a YC company, too? Maybe you can convince them to use your service instead of Bitpay, since they were thinking about using Bitcoin anyway.
Osiris 14y ago
Are there plans to make it possible to just receive the bitcoins directly rather than a cash payment in a bank account? I'd like to accept bitcoins but have the coins transferred to my wallet.
- barmstrong 14y ago
  The default is just to receive bitcoins. Cashing out to a bank account is optional and not on by default.
  - Osiris 14y ago
    Can you set the price in BTC rather than USD?
josscrowcroft 14y ago
Congrats Brian! I'll be integrating this on https://openexchangerates.org https://openexchangerates.org pretty soon (as well as including the BTC rate in the OXR API) #edit - just wondering, would it be necessary to include another BTC checkout button, e.g. from mtgox? Or can any BTC user anywhere use this button to checkout? Also - a big one - is there/will there be support for recurring payments? Actually, is that even possible?
jacoblyles 14y ago
This looks amazing. I've held off using bitcoins until now because of usability issues. This product looks like it can change that. I'm signing up today.
capdiz 14y ago
Can my bitcoin payments be sent to an external site or external bitcoin address other than a US bank account since i don't have one.
MarxGames 14y ago
I am almost ready to use this service but have some questions first: 1. Are Instant Payment Notifications sent only once with 0 confirmations? (hoping no) 2. How do I verify that the IPN is really coming from Coinbase? (hoping some simple signature check) 3. If I created a button worth 1.99$ then will it adjust BTC amount based on the current exchange rate or will it be static? (hoping it will adjust itself over time) 4. Also is it possible to see and edit buttons at a later time(hoping yes)
mtgx 14y ago
Have you taken note of this possible vulnerability? You guys need to be more careful about security. You may only get one shot at this, if you get bad PR this early by getting hacked. http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/14c7q0/coinbase_launches_payment_buttons_an_easy_way_to/c7bwmzt http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/14c7q0/coinbase_lau...
- DoubleMalt 14y ago
  This is another case of convenience vs. security. The Stripe button poses a similar problem, even if credit card number and cvc are arguably not as bad as actual login data. But it is much easier to create a frictionless user experience if you do not have to redirect people to somewhere outside your side. I recently implemented paymill payments and also there the only assurance for the customers is the 3D-Secure iFrame, if their credit card is 3D secure enabled ...
  - dlitz 14y ago
    > But it is much easier to create a frictionless user experience if you do not have to redirect people to somewhere outside your side. Under this model, how do you train ordinary users to avoid phishing?
    - DoubleMalt 14y ago
      Beats me. Of course the situation is unsatisfactory. But I like the 3D-Secure approach. Unfortunately the implementation is card provider specific and quality varies. I had a VISA once where I could enter a custom phrase that was displayed to me on every "verified by VISA" dialog. Combined with displaying the dialogue in an iframe this practice seems strike the best balance between usability and security. Of course as coinbase would have to implement something like this by themselves, but I that seems feasible.
- GigabyteCoin 14y ago
  Good advice. But I can't help but ask, this isn't THE MtGox providing this info, is it? :P
fruchtose 14y ago
Compared to other Bitcoin exchanges, I have high hopes that you guys are more confident. Taking a page out of Stripe's book is the right move, because you look less like previous Bitcoin sites and more like a startup. If Coinbase suffered a security breach I would be very disappointed.

229 points by barmstrong 14y ago

Hi Brian, cool, congratulations on making it this far! Do you think the several hours latency to the bank account deposit is going to expose people to too much exchange rate volatility?

wmf 14y ago
Since Bitcoin is unregulated, if they wanted to I guess Coinbase could lock in exchange rates at any time they choose (e.g. the time of the transaction) and then do the exchange later. Since that effectively shifts the currency risk from the merchant to Coinbase, they could choose to charge extra for such a service.

johnnyjustice 14y ago

Is this a dangerous thing to put on ones website at all?

yebyen 14y ago
Dangerous? The only danger is that you might pay 1% fee when sending/converting your earnings back to USD. Also possible that the value of bitcoin tanks overnight, but there are historical charts that show this has not really happened but just once. What kind of danger are you thinking? The exchange could also go under and/or rob you. You should be careful about to whom you give your bank account numbers.
- tmh88j 14y ago
  >What kind of danger are you thinking? My guess is he's referring to one of the many "dealers" that were hacked and had bitcoins stolen.
  - yebyen 14y ago
    That would fall into the category of exchange going under. Similar risk to cash in the mail, except with cash in the mail there's nothing you can do to protect yourself (or prove that delivery was accepted.)
    - crygin 14y ago
      It's actually somewhat riskier than cash through the mail (which is shockingly reliable), and you have no recourse, unlike the US postal service which is more than happy to insure cash mailings (up to $25k through Registered Mail) and investigate and prosecute fraud.
      - yebyen 14y ago
        That was the first danger. How much is the insurance? We were talking about 1% at CoinBase, I think that MtGox was 0.65%, and that's only for buying and selling. Withdrawals are free. Bitcoin-to-bitcoin transfers are (still) free. If it's $20,000 cash in the mail, it weighs about 200g (100 $100's) and to mail it about an hour from here (1 hour 30 minutes by car) Rochester to Buffalo, registered mail with $25,000 insurance, flat rate priority mail envelope is $53. I guess that price is the same across country. OK, so it's actually cheaper to mail cash than to trade bank dollars for bitcoins. I'll get off my pulpit now. (PS: I'm pretty sure you actually have to pay taxes on that cash you received by mail, especially if it's registered and insured, now that it's yours, it's income. Bitcoins on the other hand are not cash. I am a newbie to taxes, but I don't think you would have to pay tax on bitcoin income unless you were actually cashing them out. Maybe capital gains. Any experts?)
        tedunangst 14y ago
        You owe tax on income regardless of the form. If your employer gives you stock, you owe tax based on the stock's value the day you get it. Capital gains (or losses) mostly only applies when you sell the stock, and only to the difference in value. Same deal for bitcoins. Hell, if you're caller #9 and you just won the two week cruise, you're getting a fat tax bill and cruises aren't cash either.

UnFundedHype 14y ago

Now how about a one button way for my users to buy bit coins. Buying bitcoins is an exhausting user experience

yebyen 14y ago
You should just ask them to mail you cash. It's about equally reliable, from a buyer's perspective.
- drivingmenuts 14y ago
  I can spend cash at the corner store if it comes down to it. Bitcoin, not so much.
  - yebyen 14y ago
    Now, there's an argument for greenbacks. McDonalds takes greenbacks. Brb guys... fry cravings.
kirian 14y ago
For US users Coinbase is one of the easiest ways to buy bitcoins. Link your bank account like you would with paypal and it's straightforward from there on.
- tptacek 14y ago
  I would be very hesitant to give a new entrant my bank account information, no matter what they did with it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4703704 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4703704
  - natrius 14y ago
    My PayPal strategy, which I'd reuse for Coinbase et al, is to just create a separate checking account for that with a few clicks. I think the most they can screw me over is one or two overdraft fees before I tell my bank to stop ACH transactions.

ROFISH 14y ago

The button is working on Chrome/Windows but not Firefox/Windows. (Amusingly, it also works in IE9/Windows)

smithzvk 14y ago
Also doesn't appear to work in Firefox/Ubuntu.
barmstrong 14y ago
Thanks for the bug report! Just pushed out a fix for Firefox. Live in 5 min. Thanks!

kirian 14y ago

Bitcoin merchant services sector is really heating up. Bitpay.com making big news with the recent Wordpress announcement, Walletbit (http://bitcoinmagazine.net/walletbit-launches-bank-transfers-for-merchants-in-europe/ http://bitcoinmagazine.net/walletbit-launches-bank-transfers...) growing and adding more features and now Coinbase joining in. This open competition allowed by the open source nature of Bitcoin is great to see.

viraj_shah 14y ago

Great job Brian. Seems similar to one click Stripe button.

ww520 14y ago

How does refund work with Bitcoin? Since Bitcoin can have big swing, some users might opt to get the refund of bitcoin after a while.

wmf 14y ago
Merchants should refund an equivalent value of BTC, not the same amount paid.
- DrStalker 14y ago
  Why? Serious question, if I get a refund the amount isn't compensated for changes in the Australian dollar. Either the buyer or seller will lose out if the value of bit-coins change, so is there a compelling reason for picking which party that is other than "merchants have the control to give whatever refund amount they want"
  - wmf 14y ago
    Considering that customers generally get to choose whether and when (within a certain window) to ask for a refund, refunding the same amount of BTC gives customers a license to steal.
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
  - kamkazemoose 14y ago
    The main reason is because bitcoins are volatile. Most currencies are fairly stable, there won't be much fluctuation over the course of a week or month, for however long refunds are valid. This isn't true for bitcoins. Once you pay for something in bitcoins, you are trading those bitcoins for something of similar value at that time. I don't know what the bitcoin exchange rate is right now, so I'm just going to make up some numbers for an example. But say you buy a TV that has a value of $1000 USD. Let's say the current exchange rate is 10 bitcoins to 1 USD. Then you have to pay them 10,000 bitcoins for the TV. Say a month later, you decide you want a refund. So you return the TV. Well the TV still has a value of $1000 USD (ignoring deprecation) so you should get that same value back. If the bitcoin market has skyrocketed, to say 5 bitcoins to 1 usd, then you would get 5000bitcoins back, because those bitcoins have the same value. The merchant isn't acting as a bank to hold onto your coins for you, they are trading you something of value for something else, and if you want a refund, you'll get something of the same value back.

te 14y ago

What is coinbase's strategy re dispute resolution?

javert 14y ago

Suggestion: I found the option "Send to a bitcoin address" to be confusing. I would have expected it to say "Send from a bitcoin address." Upon further reflection, it's clear why I expected that. First, when a user goes through a typical online checkout/payment, they are not concerned about where the money is going to, they are concerned about where it is coming from, i.e., putting their credit card info in. Second, the prior option is "Send using my coinbase account," which reinforces what I was talking about in the other point I just made. For the sake of consistency, both options should be about sending from somewhere, not sending to somewhere. An alternative way to do this would be having the first option say "Send using Coinbase" and the second option be "Send using the Bitcoin network," or something to that effect.

kirian 14y ago
Yes, I agree with the above comment, "Pay using bitcoin" or "Send bitcoins" or something like that would be less confusing I think.
barmstrong 14y ago
Ok good feedback. While technically it is correct that you are sending to a single bitcoin address (your payment can actually come from multiple bitcoin addresses) I agree it's confusing and the the distinction isn't important to more users. It now reads like this: http://cl.ly/image/2n3Y3F261o1s http://cl.ly/image/2n3Y3F261o1s
- javert 14y ago
  Sweet, I like it much better that way. Good point that your payment likely would come from multiple addresses, I had overlooked that.

discountgenius 14y ago

Are you working on plugins for integration with existing shopping carts?

e1ven 14y ago

I'd love to transparently accept BTC on a website I'm building, and have the merchant company send me a check every month.. I'm really hesitant to use (and thus implicitly recommend) Coinbase, since they're asking for Bank username/passwords from users. Even thought it's not necessary, it makes these guys really look rather Shady to me, so I'm really reluctant to use their solution. Has anyone else worked with Bitpay or other providers in this space? I'd love to hear how things went for you.

barmstrong 14y ago
Founder here - just wanted to clarify that bank username/password is not required, you can also use deposit verification. But glad to hear you're interested in accepting bitcoin. Thanks!
- clark-kent 14y ago
  I think it is reasonable to remove the bank username/password requirement. All it does is raise red flags for potential users.

frozenport 14y ago

Suggestion 1: Offer to convert user funds to bitcoins (works as an annoying service). So you act as a money proxy. Suggestion 2: Explain what bitcoins are for shopping cart users

dllthomas 14y ago
annoying?
Karunamon 14y ago
#1 puts you in shaky legal territory at least in the united states, since cash exchange services have a huge litany of regulations.
tled 14y ago
I also find it hard to explain to users what and how to use Bitcoin. I'm running a women fashion e-commerce site and most of users are women and non-tech.

kenj0418 14y ago

Great - now we only need a 'Why To Accept Bitcoin On Your Website' article.

kirian 14y ago
Some good "Why To Accept Bitcoin" reasons in this article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2012/11/16/whats-your-bitcoin-strategy-wordpress-now-accepts-bitcoin-across-the-planet/ http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmatonis/2012/11/16/whats-your...

mtgx 14y ago

What are the limitations regarding the location of the users or merchants, if there are any? Can I send and receive Bitcoin through Coinbase to and from anywhere? I assume the bank thing only works with US banks? I'm not sure about the color of the button. Seems rather dull to me, and might be easily missed. You might want to A/B test that. I like what you're doing, though. An easy to use Paypal-like service is very needed in the Bitcoin world. Wasn't Reddit a YC company, too? Maybe you can convince them to use your service instead of Bitpay, since they were thinking about using Bitcoin anyway.

Osiris 14y ago

Are there plans to make it possible to just receive the bitcoins directly rather than a cash payment in a bank account? I'd like to accept bitcoins but have the coins transferred to my wallet.

barmstrong 14y ago
The default is just to receive bitcoins. Cashing out to a bank account is optional and not on by default.
- Osiris 14y ago
  Can you set the price in BTC rather than USD?

josscrowcroft 14y ago

Congrats Brian! I'll be integrating this on https://openexchangerates.org https://openexchangerates.org pretty soon (as well as including the BTC rate in the OXR API) #edit - just wondering, would it be necessary to include another BTC checkout button, e.g. from mtgox? Or can any BTC user anywhere use this button to checkout? Also - a big one - is there/will there be support for recurring payments? Actually, is that even possible?

jacoblyles 14y ago

This looks amazing. I've held off using bitcoins until now because of usability issues. This product looks like it can change that. I'm signing up today.

capdiz 14y ago

Can my bitcoin payments be sent to an external site or external bitcoin address other than a US bank account since i don't have one.

MarxGames 14y ago

I am almost ready to use this service but have some questions first: 1. Are Instant Payment Notifications sent only once with 0 confirmations? (hoping no) 2. How do I verify that the IPN is really coming from Coinbase? (hoping some simple signature check) 3. If I created a button worth 1.99$ then will it adjust BTC amount based on the current exchange rate or will it be static? (hoping it will adjust itself over time) 4. Also is it possible to see and edit buttons at a later time(hoping yes)

mtgx 14y ago

Have you taken note of this possible vulnerability? You guys need to be more careful about security. You may only get one shot at this, if you get bad PR this early by getting hacked. http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/14c7q0/coinbase_launches_payment_buttons_an_easy_way_to/c7bwmzt http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/14c7q0/coinbase_lau...

DoubleMalt 14y ago
This is another case of convenience vs. security. The Stripe button poses a similar problem, even if credit card number and cvc are arguably not as bad as actual login data. But it is much easier to create a frictionless user experience if you do not have to redirect people to somewhere outside your side. I recently implemented paymill payments and also there the only assurance for the customers is the 3D-Secure iFrame, if their credit card is 3D secure enabled ...
- dlitz 14y ago
  > But it is much easier to create a frictionless user experience if you do not have to redirect people to somewhere outside your side. Under this model, how do you train ordinary users to avoid phishing?
  - DoubleMalt 14y ago
    Beats me. Of course the situation is unsatisfactory. But I like the 3D-Secure approach. Unfortunately the implementation is card provider specific and quality varies. I had a VISA once where I could enter a custom phrase that was displayed to me on every "verified by VISA" dialog. Combined with displaying the dialogue in an iframe this practice seems strike the best balance between usability and security. Of course as coinbase would have to implement something like this by themselves, but I that seems feasible.
GigabyteCoin 14y ago
Good advice. But I can't help but ask, this isn't THE MtGox providing this info, is it? :P

fruchtose 14y ago

Compared to other Bitcoin exchanges, I have high hopes that you guys are more confident. Taking a page out of Stripe's book is the right move, because you look less like previous Bitcoin sites and more like a startup. If Coinbase suffered a security breach I would be very disappointed.