Stupid question...Paypal or bank account?

[steve B]

Originally Posted by brass_rat

1) From a pure "safety" standpoint, as long as you are using a "strong" password, your account is probably as safe as that as your bank's online account. (Definite preference to banks that use 2-factor authentication though.) I would recommend using a password management service such as 1password (https://1password.com) to manage your passwords (don't use the same password across accounts, don't use "weak" passwords).

NO, Paypal has a security hole large enough to drive a bunch of armored cars through.


I had my email compromised, probably by some malware that captured passwords.

Paypal password changed, payments sent, Paypal said "oh no, those aren't fraudulent, they're just like the rest of your transactions" - Even though I've never randomly sent 400 to someone in … I forget where, some African country that's not one of the usual suspects.

2nd factor was them sending a text asking if the second one was ok. At 4 AM. it timed out before we got up. so 2 factor as they implement it is essentially useless.

Got the bank to reverse them, but it took about a month.


Thought we had it all fixed, different email, even stronger passwords, get it back on.

Password changed, money sent, 200 and 400 They caught one but not the other. Denied the one they didn't catch. This crew was smarter, or the same ones had learned, I never got emails telling me about the payments. I suspect they were deleted off the server before my email program could download them.




Paypal is totally unsecured, and will not help whatsoever if anything happens.


Steve Birmingham