Thought of this more recently. The amount of control tech has over credit or debit cards is dangerous. Not to mention a power outage leaves you with nothing. Or if someday companies decide you can’t use their credit card certain ways.

Its kind of unfeasible today, but maybe we should be using cash for every possible thing…

  • valar@lemmy.ca
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    19 days ago

    Yes. Every purchase made on a credit card is tracked and profiled and sold to third parties. You agree to this in the terms of service. That goes double for online payment services like PayPal or Venmo.

  • tal@lemmy.today
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    19 days ago

    If it would be a concern for you, I’d imagine that ATMs probably scan bill serial numbers.

  • rozodru@piefed.world
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    18 days ago

    I use cash as much as I can. sometimes you get a discount if you pay in cash in some places. There’s a computer parts store near me that does this. If I pay cash I get a discount because it’s better for them than paying visa/mc/interac fees I guess.

  • Daryl76679@lemmy.ml
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    19 days ago

    I always make sure I have a consistent amount of cash in my wallet. Makes it easier to feel confident I can make all but the largest purchases in cash. Also happy cake day!

  • zzffyfajzkzhnsweqm@sh.itjust.works
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    19 days ago

    Digital euro projects claims that it will solve that issue. If they will go with current design it will be more private, better and more convinient than cash. It will work offline p2p and without global transaction tracking. And it will not be dependent on a single company.

      • zzffyfajzkzhnsweqm@sh.itjust.works
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        17 days ago

        Normal cash can be tracked. Each buck has a serial number. While with digital euro it does not have to be that way. While we do not have implementation yet, it most certanly is possible to develop something that is less tracable that cash. One example qould be monero crypto currency that is more private and more anonymous than cash. While I do not think privacy will go this deep, I think Implementation of privacy would be comparable to cash transactions.

        About it being offline: If you have a transaction I signed with my private key for example over NFC you do not need it to be online at all. You can always prove I paid you.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_euro

        • WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works
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          14 days ago

          One example qould be monero crypto currency that is more private and more anonymous than cash.

          did they fix the small ring size already? it was a big topic last year. if they haven’t, then no its not more private than cash, because it has a public record of the transaction where the real sender is hiding between a dozen or two decoy senders. with cash there is nothing like that.

          I think Implementation of privacy would be comparable to cash transactions.

          exchange of non-electronic physical items will always be more private than trusting a blackbox machine (any computer) running whatever payment standard accepted in the local economic area. with a good standard that could be acceptable, but the point stands.

          About it being offline: If you have a transaction I signed with my private key for example over NFC you do not need it to be online at all. You can always prove I paid you.

          double spend prevention requires one party to be online.

  • AA5B@lemmy.world
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    18 days ago

    Plus sometimes credit scores do weird things. At one point I had a credit card with a running balance (bad idea. Don’t do that). I used it for years while I gradually caught up. No problem adding new charges all along. I finally caught up. I breathed a sigh of relief thinking I was in better shape financially ……. And they canceled the card

  • hansolo@lemmy.today
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    18 days ago

    I’m of the opinion that it can be worth it to throw a few stale and sterile bread crumbs out there, curated, in order to divert, that’s better than trying to be a ghost. Depends on your threat model.

    Use a card for innocuous things. Gas. Occasional groceries. Airplane tickets since it’s toured to your ID anyway. Things like that where using cash doesnt really get you any benefit anyway, or where it’s vanilla enough that it just makes you seem like any other person.

  • dihutenosa@piefed.social
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    18 days ago

    What for? My grocery store (and every other merchant I frequent) already knows and tracks what I buy. Nothing would stop them selling the data to advertisers, even if I paid for my bread in Bitcoin.

    • FatherPeanut@pawb.social
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      18 days ago

      Mitigation, not elimination. 'Cuz not every purchase uses a loyalty card that ties it to you, nor does every grocery store have facial recognition, nor do any grocery stores report their transactions to your card provider. Plus the (hopefully) most impactful, paying in plastic usually costs ~3% more.