
Liberapay is in trouble - dEnigma
https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/liberapay-is-in-trouble-b58b40714d82
======
Sir_Cmpwn
Shame on Mangopay. This isn't how you treat a customer, especially one who
does as much social good as Liberapay. I hope everyone here remembers this
next time they have to select a payment processor.

~~~
zajd
Running the fundraising infrastructure for neonazis isn't really "social good"
if you ask me.

~~~
sctb
Could you please not do this?

> _Eschew flamebait. Don 't introduce flamewar topics unless you have
> something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic
> tangents._

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
zajd
It's not unrelated. If people want to wax poetic about how much social good an
organization who's on record as breaking the law to fund neonazi groups they
should probably provide a reason for the justification.

~~~
acct1771
Could you elaborate on "breaking the law"?

~~~
zajd
[https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.org/issues/11](https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.org/issues/11)

------
pjc50
Apparently due to a single "controversial user":
[https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/the-first-year-of-
liberapa...](https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/the-first-year-of-
liberapay-e57a3e08a662)

Although I can't figure out who. Possibly
[https://www.byline.com/column/58/article/1409](https://www.byline.com/column/58/article/1409)
?

~~~
jtbayly
No. That’s an old article. Different event. Perhaps same problem, but there’s
no evidence I’ve seen to support that yet.

------
ur-whale
A small business being at the mercy of random payment providers is yet another
demonstration that there is a fundamental social need as well as a strong
market demand for decentralized payment systems like Bitcoin.

~~~
Frondo
I would rather see a nationalized service, maybe offered through postal
banking, for fee-free instant money transfer. Banking, for such basic
purposes, should be treated as a utility. It isn't sexy, it isn't flash, it's
roads for money. Nothing more.

~~~
ur-whale
> I would rather see a nationalized service

And how is that going to help with the OP problem, I wonder?

Gov't says your business ain't what we like, payment can't happen, business is
dead.

~~~
hakfoo
Interestingly, a state monopoly could actually be more tolerant on some types
of business, because of the legalities associated. As an arm of the state,
it's subject to the state's obligations for equal access and service.

If their policies were anything less than "we support any legal business",
they'd be spending decades in the courts.

Conversely, a lot of private payment processors are beholden to the tastes of
their clients and investors. Even if you have all the right metrics and tech
about fraud, chargebacks, customer satisfaction, see how many processors close
their doors if you say you're selling rifles or porn.

------
maeln
I guess their payment processor got sick of handling thousand of tiny payment
and gave them a random excuse to boot them out asap.

~~~
espadrine
> _Mangopay hasn’t provided a detailed explanation of their decision, so we’re
> not sure. We’ve tried to understand their concerns, they seemed related to
> the fact that Liberapay is open to everyone_

Likelier: Liberapay’s KYC was insufficient.

Mangopay probably received a call from the regulator, and they realized that
they could not ensure that Liberapay was not (unwittingly) letting people
launder money or finance terrorism.

The AML/CFT requirements that would have needed to be applied by Liberapay to
all its users would probably have caused such friction that they would have
grown much slower, however.

~~~
maeln
It is also a strong possibility but wouldn't Mangopay would have given some
time for Librapay to adapt to the regulation ?

The fact that they stop the contract so soon without previous warning (unless
Librapay is not disclosing everything) is what make it really weird for me.

~~~
calpaterson
> It is also a strong possibility but wouldn't Mangopay would have given some
> time for Librapay to adapt to the regulation ?

No anti-money laundering law doesn't work that way

> The fact that they stop the contract so soon without previous warning
> (unless Librapay is not disclosing everything) is what make it really weird
> for me.

That is completely normal (in fact giving notice is pretty lenient), if a
financial institution suspects you of money laundering weird things will begin
to happen to you such as freezes, orders being ignored, surprise account
closures, etc. You will under no circumstances receive an explanation as that
in itself is a serious criminal offense because it is considered to be helpful
to money launderers when you explain to them what they did that aroused
suspicion.

Note to readers: if weird things start happening to your bank account (delayed
or ignored payments, logouts, etc) get on the phone to the bank and be as
helpful to them as you can be. That is typically the only way to get this
resolved.

~~~
lixtra
With apparently 13 k€ per month processed, how much could they launder?

No harm would have been done by giving them a few months grace period.

~~~
espadrine
The amount is irrelevant.

Financing Nazis is illegal, especially in France, which had a bit of an
economic setback about sixty years ago because of them. Oh, and a lot of death
and suffering.

[https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.org/issues/11](https://github.com/liberapay/liberapay.org/issues/11)

~~~
icebraining
That thread is not about money laundering, and it's two years old.

------
thiscatis
So a donation site with practically no AML/KYC/CTF procedures got shut down by
their regulation-bound payment processor?

~~~
icebraining
No, they require your personal information according to the KYC rules defined
by MangoPay:
[https://docs.mangopay.com/guide/kyc](https://docs.mangopay.com/guide/kyc)

As a small-time donor, I had to give them the info listed there under "Light
Authentification". People who give or receive more have to submit copies of
their passport or governmental ID .

~~~
jtbayly
Thank you for actual data.

------
bionoid
Edit: Strike this, I opened two tabs and read the wrong one :)

The article is dated February 2017, I didn't notice before "In 2017 we’re
going to keep improving Liberapay." near the end. According to their frontpage
today, 462 new donations were started in the past month (totaling €350/week).
The headline seems misleading.

~~~
CiaranR
This article is dated `2018-07-12T21:09:44.399Z`

~~~
bionoid
Weird, I landed on "The First Year of Liberapay" [0], not sure if the link was
edited or I _somehow_ misclicked..

Edit: my bad, I opened the link from a comment..

[0] [https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/the-first-year-of-
liberapa...](https://medium.com/liberapay-blog/the-first-year-of-
liberapay-e57a3e08a662)

------
nottorp
Dear Medium,

Can you stop pressuring me to register when I open a link to you? I closed the
tab without reading the article, and soon you'll piss me off enough that i'll
remember to not open medium links...

~~~
jtbayly
Dear nottorp,

Can you please fight this battle elsewhere and keep your comments on topic? I
know it’s irritating. I agree. Just not the right place in my opinion. I came
here looking for comments on the article.

Thanks,

~~~
nottorp
Where? On Medium? I don't read the site unless it's linked to on HN...

