The Federation of Canadian Naturists are threatening to sue PayPal for taking away their account. The group have been taking PayPal payments for their magazine, Going Natural, for four years now, but say that PayPal have now cancelled their account, saying that they were publishing pornography. They say that they have received emails from PayPal accusing them of selling “sexually oriented goods or services involving minors” or “services for which the purpose is to facilitate meetings for sexually oriented activities.”
A spokeswoman for the FCN said that PayPal’s actions were “born of ignorance”, and that naturism is a social movement unrelated to sexual activity. The Federation is now considering a class action lawsuit.
This is not the first time PayPal has made an apparently arbitrary decision on what is acceptable to sell: Canna Zine, who sell cannabis seeds in the UK, recently had their PayPal account taken away due to “company policy”. Before building a business that relies on PayPal, merchants need to check the Acceptable Use Policy, which prohibits using PayPal to pay for, amongst other things, weapons, lottery tickets and “get rich quick” schemes.
10 Responses
If get rich quick schemes are banned why are so many get rich ebook sellers taking paypal on ebay?
Because they’re selling ebooks, not membership of a scheme.
hi sue …… 😉
does this mean you can’t sell ”membership to a criminal fraternity benefits club” – but you can sell an ebook on how to rob banks? 😯
j.t.
No, you can’t sell an ebook on how to rob banks under para. 2c “items that encourage, promote, facilitate or instruct others to engage in illegal activity”.
– ahaa – got it 😀
Cheeky 😀
Classic.
I wonder why Paypal suddenly decided to drop them. Was it because of material or a more literal interpretation of their TOS?
You can’t sell eBooks on eBay at all any more. There’s just been a policy change.
But as for this story, I hope they DO sue PayPal, and I hope they win. PayPal are totally arbitrary about this nonsense. I know a maker of digital 3D models (which are used in various 3D modelling/rendering programs) who has for sale on his site a couple of very, very basic male and female figures. These figures are so basic, they haven’t even got genitals. They’re just mannequins, no “naughty bits” whatsoever. And yet because he had images of these neuter, virtual, vaguely human figures on his site, PayPal decided this was pornographic and shut down his account. 🙄
On the other hand, PayPal is happy to do business with other 3D sites that feature LOADS of nudity of all kinds.
PayPal are arbitrary and ridiculous. I hope the nudists, errr… naturalists sue the pants off of PayPal. Maybe literally.
Well, I remember a few years ago, Paypal cancelled the account of http://www.whatreallyhappened.com and told them they could get their money in six months! Check it out at https://www.whatreallyhappened.com/paypal.html
just because they didn’t like the politics
AC
I wonder why Paypal suddenly decided to drop them. Was it because of material or a more literal interpretation of their TOS?’
Like everything on ebay/paypal probably because someone complained.