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+0.29 PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds (www.engadget.com)
814 points by I_am_tiberius 1504 days ago | 311 comments on HN | Mild positive Editorial · v3.7 ·
Summary Property Rights & Due Process Advocates
This article reports on a federal lawsuit filed against PayPal by three customers alleging arbitrary seizure of their funds ($26,984 to $172,000+) without explanation or fair legal process. The case centers on violations of property rights (Article 17) and due process (Article 10), with plaintiffs claiming PayPal froze accounts, seized funds, and refused to provide explanation or opportunity to be heard. By extensively documenting the plaintiffs' claims and directly quoting the complaint's allegations of PayPal's "widespread business practice" of seizure "without cause and without any fair or due process," the article advocates for these fundamental rights.
Article Heatmap
Preamble: +0.24 — Preamble P Article 1: +0.18 — Freedom, Equality, Brotherhood 1 Article 2: ND — Non-Discrimination Article 2: No Data — Non-Discrimination 2 Article 3: +0.12 — Life, Liberty, Security 3 Article 4: ND — No Slavery Article 4: No Data — No Slavery 4 Article 5: ND — No Torture Article 5: No Data — No Torture 5 Article 6: ND — Legal Personhood Article 6: No Data — Legal Personhood 6 Article 7: +0.30 — Equality Before Law 7 Article 8: +0.36 — Right to Remedy 8 Article 9: +0.30 — No Arbitrary Detention 9 Article 10: +0.48 — Fair Hearing 10 Article 11: ND — Presumption of Innocence Article 11: No Data — Presumption of Innocence 11 Article 12: ND — Privacy Article 12: No Data — Privacy 12 Article 13: ND — Freedom of Movement Article 13: No Data — Freedom of Movement 13 Article 14: ND — Asylum Article 14: No Data — Asylum 14 Article 15: ND — Nationality Article 15: No Data — Nationality 15 Article 16: ND — Marriage & Family Article 16: No Data — Marriage & Family 16 Article 17: +0.24 — Property 17 Article 18: ND — Freedom of Thought Article 18: No Data — Freedom of Thought 18 Article 19: ND — Freedom of Expression Article 19: No Data — Freedom of Expression 19 Article 20: ND — Assembly & Association Article 20: No Data — Assembly & Association 20 Article 21: ND — Political Participation Article 21: No Data — Political Participation 21 Article 22: +0.18 — Social Security 22 Article 23: ND — Work & Equal Pay Article 23: No Data — Work & Equal Pay 23 Article 24: ND — Rest & Leisure Article 24: No Data — Rest & Leisure 24 Article 25: ND — Standard of Living Article 25: No Data — Standard of Living 25 Article 26: ND — Education Article 26: No Data — Education 26 Article 27: ND — Cultural Participation Article 27: No Data — Cultural Participation 27 Article 28: ND — Social & International Order Article 28: No Data — Social & International Order 28 Article 29: ND — Duties to Community Article 29: No Data — Duties to Community 29 Article 30: ND — No Destruction of Rights Article 30: No Data — No Destruction of Rights 30
Negative Neutral Positive No Data
Aggregates
Weighted Mean +0.29 Unweighted Mean +0.27
Max +0.48 Article 10 Min +0.12 Article 3
Signal 9 No Data 22
Confidence 23% Volatility 0.10 (Low)
Negative 0 Channels E: 0.6 S: 0.4
SETL +0.50 Editorial-dominant
FW Ratio 53% 20 facts · 18 inferences
Evidence: High: 5 Medium: 3 Low: 1 No Data: 22
Theme Radar
Foundation Security Legal Privacy & Movement Personal Expression Economic & Social Cultural Order & Duties Foundation: 0.21 (2 articles) Security: 0.12 (1 articles) Legal: 0.36 (4 articles) Privacy & Movement: 0.00 (0 articles) Personal: 0.24 (1 articles) Expression: 0.00 (0 articles) Economic & Social: 0.18 (1 articles) Cultural: 0.00 (0 articles) Order & Duties: 0.00 (0 articles)
HN Discussion 20 top-level · 30 replies
antihero 2022-01-14 12:50 UTC link
Thing that amazes me is that people leave huge amounts of money in their PayPal instead of withdrawing it regularly. Why not just withdraw it, and then PayPal has nothing to seize!
acomjean 2022-01-14 12:56 UTC link
“using PayPal to buy and sell clothing on eBay, to exchange money for a poker league she owns and for a non-profit that helps women with various needs. “

I can see one of those things causing an issue (poker league)

We use PayPal for membership fees for our nonprofit. This year they’re limiting us to 2000 a month transfer out which is annoying to us, but we’re small enough to get by.

pizza234 2022-01-14 13:18 UTC link
Very good news, especially the potential class action.

Something that I find very interesting is how the individual lawsuits will end. I remember (but can't find) a David vs Goliath case from some time ago, where a user brought Google to the small claims court. He won the case in that venue, but subsequently lost when Google followed up an brought a huge amount of documentation and won. The guy's conclusion was that Google knows _a lot_ of stuff and can leverage it; I think that the events could play similarly, here.

creshal 2022-01-14 13:29 UTC link
I've been battling dumb Paypal problems both on the end user and the merchant side so often that I'll never again use it if at all possible, especially in shops. It's just not worth the time and effort to try and trick them into doing their job.
miohtama 2022-01-14 14:21 UTC link
The problem is that usually anti-money laundering laws give the operator and the compliance officer an infinite protection even on a suspected money laundering. As long as the compliance process is followed, no matter how stupid the process is, there is no legal basis to go after account freezer and the company is protected. Thus, the company has no incentive to be reasonable with account freezes.
Ekaros 2022-01-14 14:48 UTC link
That took way way too long... How is it possible that this happens only now and not shortly after PayPal launched?
dm03514 2022-01-14 15:04 UTC link
I'm so happy to see this. I am working on publishing a book on leanpub, and leanpub disburses payments using paypal. Yesterday, I logged into my paypal account and I remembered that this happened to me and my funds and account were frozen since 2010 (something I must have put out of my mind :p).

I was searching for this issue and found this lawsuit and cannot wait to be part of it.

Dealing with Paypal during the time was borderline abusive and I felt helpless every step of the way. In 2010 when they froze my account they mailed me a physical letter with an activation code which took weeks, and when I called to confirm my account I was told that the code was incorrect...

I had very very little money in my account < $100 and I can't imagine how frustrating it would be for someone who needed paypal for their income.

I'm happy to be in a position where I can choose to never use paypal again and I hope they are punished for the way they treat their customers.

kweks 2022-01-14 15:21 UTC link
We are Europe's largest site for RFID and pentesting hardware (lab401.com)

We are in the exactly the same situation. PayPal has conducted a personalised, manually executed war of attrition against our company and shareholders.

Eight months ago, PayPal froze our account, seizing 15kEU. They refused to give any justification for the action, despite discussions with C-level staff.

After the 180-day "withholding" period, we were informed that they would not release the funds, for undisclosed reasons.

We immediately engaged legal counsel. PayPal refused to interact with our counsel, and so a C&D was issued. Within one week of the C&D, PayPal did the following:

- Froze the account of our sister company (in Hong Kong), seizing 35k EU

- Froze the personal accounts of all shareholders of the EU and HK corps (~1,5k EU)

- Froze the business accounts of all shareholders by name search (different corporate entities, different businesses) - 5kEU

- Froze the business accounts that the shareholders held (again, different corps, different businesses) - another 5kEU

Our policy is to empty accounts on the 28th of each month. PayPal froze and seized funds in all accounts on the 27th of the month. Based on the time-stamps of the emails, and the order in which the accounts we closed, it's obvious that it was a targeted, manual process (2 - 3 minutes between closing each personal account, 15 minutes to find the next company account, 3 - 5 to close the personal accounts, and then 10 - 15 minutes for the next company accounts).

We engaged secondary legal counsel in Luxembourg (PayPal's EU headquarters). Again, PayPal refused to disclose any reason, justification or proof, replying with typo-ridden copy-pasted document from a low-level legal peon, concluding that no funds would be returned, the businesses and personal accounts were deemed 'illegal', and as such, PayPal would confiscate all funds.

All KYC was performed. All accounts had been "audited" by PayPal (when you reach the 5k, 50k, 100k+ processing tiers).

Needless to say, operationally - we have shipped 50kEU of hardware to customers, and face losses of the hardware, and costs of replacing stock. I agree with the standpoint: this is purely racketeering - an online equivalent of Civil Forfeiture.

For extra context, as the points have been raised in other comments:

- In a perfect world, no merchant would use PayPal. In our experiments, disabling PayPal cuts revenue by ~30% in our industries.

- Pentesting products could include illegal products: keyloggers, etc. We sell no such products for obvious legal and compliance reasons. All the products we sell are sold by countless other resellers that use PayPal. We have processed Visa/MC with Stripe for over 6 years with no problems (legal, chargeback, etc)

- We empty accounts regularly, to minimize fallout. However, you have to keep a healthy minimum in accounts when dealing with large volume, or accounts get limited automatically (presumably to avoid merchants pulling cash to avoid chargebacks / refunds)

- We have already 'invested' over 20k in legal fees. I justify this cost in (perhaps falsely) believing that we could establish some case law that could benefit other merchants.

It's unfortunate that we cannot join the class action in the US, or we'd be into it. With that said, if anyone merchant in the EU has similar issues, it could be interesting to investigate if a similar action can be mounted in the EU. Feel free to reach out: simon at sn dot cm (not a typo).

b8 2022-01-14 15:22 UTC link
I'm happy that this is happening. Small buisness owners, Twitch streamers etc. can get their PayPal account locked pretty easily for "suspicious" activity (i.e chargebacks or a few thousand dollars). Then PayPal locks their account for 180 days with little to no recourse. The big Twitch streamers register an LLC which PayPals gives more leniency to AFAIU.
ckastner 2022-01-14 15:24 UTC link
> Lena Evans, one of the plaintiffs who'd been a PayPal user for 22 years, said the website seized $26,984 from her account six months after it got frozen without ever telling her why.

Wait, what? They're actually taking the money? I thought the article was just being careless with the terms "frozen" and "seized".

On what power are they doing so? It's understandable when the relevant authorities (be it a tax authority, or a financial supervisory authority, or a court, or whatever) seize money, but they are not an authority.

Furthermore, if the money in question actually were illicit, then by what fantasy argument would they be allowed to keep it themselves rather than having to hand it over to the goverment? The entire point is that the money is dirty and nobody may keep it.

Jiro 2022-01-14 15:45 UTC link
Link to actual lawsuit: https://aupdamages.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/PayPal_Fil...

(I had to Google this and find it in a Reddit thread, so it's not directly from the court's website. If anyone can find that it'd help)

bastardoperator 2022-01-14 16:22 UTC link
This has been happening to folks for ages. I'm looking forward to understanding why Paypal thinks it can steal from it's customers without facing repercussions. I wouldn't do anything serious with Paypal for this exact reason.
johnboiles 2022-01-14 16:42 UTC link
Great to see this! Not to the same scale as seizure but using buymeacoffee.com for OSS donations PayPal would lock my account every month or two until I uploaded a bunch of documents (which were always the same docs each time). Each time it was a little uncertain if I'd be able to get my money out or not. Meanwhile PayPal would happily continue to receive money in my name that I didn't have access to.
mdavis6890 2022-01-14 16:42 UTC link
This is devastating to those users affected by this, but I believe that the blame doesn't lie solely with PayPal. Unfortunately there are many laws they must comply with that delegate enforcement to private companies like PayPal rather than where is belongs - the government.

From the article: PayPal allegedly sent his wife a letter that says she "violated PayPal's User Agreement and Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) by accepting payments for the sale of injectable fillers not approved by the FDA."

If PayPal DOESN'T freeze the account and hold the money, they can get in far larger trouble with the government. Why should PayPal be involved in this enforcement at all? If the FDA doesn't like what this seller is doing, let the FDA themselves go after the seller and leave PayPal out of it. But the law doesn't work that way.

I had $10k's in an account with BofA that was frozen and nearly killed the closing on a house I was buying at the time. Because they had a mailbox address on file for me, rather than my home address. It was horrible for me, but that's what the says that they had to do, and if they didn't the could end up in trouble with the feds facing huge penalties.

Let's try to empathize with all parties and think rationally about the incentives and constraints that they face.

theplumber 2022-01-14 17:49 UTC link
Recently I've been suspended from an "online bank". It's a traumatic experience, especially if you need the money held in that account.

Fortunately the amount I had there was not that big but the abusive procedure is trumatic. I can't imagine how someone would feel like to have all his rent money blocked in an online bank.

Basically you are told that unless you provide whatever documentation they want you loose the access to your own funds. Of course providing them documentation is no guarantee they will lift the restrictions. The support is via email only. The boarding and verification process it's really just a bite and switch scheme. I don't know how someone would feel safe to keep money in such a bank after they put your account/transactions on hold for days.

I start to like the "crypto currency" concept of owning your money more and more.

jedberg 2022-01-14 18:42 UTC link
When I worked at PayPal, some of the execs would say "we don't make money by giving it back to people". These were the execs that worked directly with Theil and Musk and I'm sure they're long gone, but it was definitely Theil and Musk who pushed for these types of policies right from the start (well Musk agreed when he showed up, he wasn't a founder of PayPal despite what he wants you to believe).
vamega 2022-01-14 19:28 UTC link
Hearing the stories in this thread makes me wonder if anyone has ever tried to get a decree that PayPal owes them the money, and if PayPal refuses to pay show up to confiscate their property.

I know things like this have happened to banks[1]. That would probably get them to start paying attention.

[1]: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/bank-america-florida-foreclo...

basher 2022-01-14 19:58 UTC link
PayPal refuses to let heirs access, or even know if there is a balance on accounts after people die, regardless of death certificates. I wonder how much money is being held by this tactic?
aasasd 2022-01-14 20:09 UTC link
I've heard about their ‘freeze and seize’ business model in mid-late 2000s, so it's been going on for almost fifteen years already, maybe more.

Meanwhile Paypal's early top execs are icons of US business and techbros. This Musk is probably a really solid guy, what's not to like!

alfalfasprout 2022-01-14 21:27 UTC link
I refuse to use paypal for any nontrivial amounts of money for this exact reason. I once had $10k frozen for no reason at all. I really needed that money back then. Was an absolute nightmare and took weeks to unfreeze.

The only thing I now trust for "quick" payments of larger amounts of money is bank wire.

Cryptocurrencies don't exactly solve this problem since you need to convert back to the fiat currency and you then have exchange rate volatility + withdrawal delays (and crypto exchanges also are notorious for freezing withdrawals).

genocidicbunny 2022-01-14 13:00 UTC link
Sometimes PayPal institutes transfer limits on accounts, so its entirely possible that they don't let you transfer out the money fast enough.
boring_twenties 2022-01-14 13:19 UTC link
In the past at least, PayPal has also been known for simply taking funds from your linked banked account.

So maybe it's better to not link a bank account at all, which means leaving funds in your PayPal account until you can spend them (since you have no way of withdrawing).

creshal 2022-01-14 13:30 UTC link
Paypal still makes it hard for you to automatically transfer out money, so you have to remember to do it manually every so often. And then they'll block you anyway because you tried to transfer out

- too much

- too often

- too seldomly

- too little

Or any combination thereof. The only winning move it to not use it in the first place.

CaptainZapp 2022-01-14 13:32 UTC link
If they don't like that their service is used for poker activities they are free to dump the customer.

What they are not free to do is to freeze his account and just keep his money.

Cederfjard 2022-01-14 13:53 UTC link
So they’re preventing you from accessing your own money?
Cthulhu_ 2022-01-14 14:21 UTC link
Well if that's in their T's and C's that's fine, to a point, but they can't just silently close an account and take money from people. They need to return the money - it's not their job to play police and judge and seize illicit gains, a court has to decide whether it IS illicit and what happens to it first - and to give an explanation as to why they no longer want to do business with them.

I mean not wanting to do business is every business and person's right. But taking someone else's money without a court order or mandate is theft.

manbart 2022-01-14 14:43 UTC link
Freezing the account or booting the user from the service is one thing, but seizing the money as a result without any due process seems pretty messed up IMO
johnebgd 2022-01-14 14:52 UTC link
PayPal has worked hard to not be a “bank” so they are long overdue for being sued about this. I know countless vendors who have had their funds stolen.
notch656a 2022-01-14 15:04 UTC link
AML/KYC laws are a travesty to a free society. Wealth transfer shouldn't be illegal. Prosecute the underlying crimes and let the judicial process seize proceeds of crime after due process. In the meantime, various electronic systems continue to provide adequate avenues for those seeking minimized exposure to KYC/AML.
gruez 2022-01-14 15:30 UTC link
>They're actually taking the money? I thought the article was just being careless with the terms "frozen" and "seized".

but that's also the plaintiff's claim, so I wouldn't exactly call that reliable.

tootahe45 2022-01-14 15:30 UTC link
They offer the worst currency conversion rate imaginable when you go to withdraw to your non-US bank, so some people prefer to keep it in PP as a USD spending account i guess.
kweks 2022-01-14 15:34 UTC link
See my comment below: they just seized (not frozen, seized) 50k EU from us in a targetted attack against our company and shareholders because we took legal counsel when they froze the accounts.
nikanj 2022-01-14 15:45 UTC link
On what power? ”We are big and have money. You are small and have no money”.

This has been a reliable source of power for at least a century

mdek 2022-01-14 15:58 UTC link
Per the article, Paypal is seizing the money as damages:

> It also said that the money was taken from her account "for its liquidated damages arising from those AUP violations pursuant to the User Agreement.

kingcharles 2022-01-14 16:07 UTC link
It took a bit to find it because PACER's search is awful. Plus you have to PAY for every search.

I bought all the current docket entries and added them to RECAP so you can download them for free:

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/62596200/evans-v-paypal...

EDIT: From PayPal's AUP in the Complaint.. yowch! "You acknowledge and agree that $2,500.00 U.S. dollars per violation of the Acceptable Use Policy is presently a reasonable minimum estimate of PayPal’s actual damages - including, but not limited to, internal administrative costs incurred by PayPal to monitor and track violations, damage to PayPal’s brand and reputation, and penalties imposed upon PayPal by its business partners resulting from a user’s violation - considering all currently existing circumstances, including the relationship of the sum to the range of harm to PayPal that reasonably could be anticipated because, due to the nature of the violations of the Acceptable Use Policy, actual damages would be impractical or extremely difficult to calculate. PayPal may deduct such damages directly from any existing balance in any PayPal account you control."

kmlx 2022-01-14 16:25 UTC link
> leanpub disburses payments using paypal

generally speaking, is it more complicated for these kinds of payments to be done via wire/swift/etc versus paypal?

designium 2022-01-14 16:27 UTC link
Don't worry.

You won't have that money after they've implemented the inactivity fee last year: https://www.paypal.com/be/smarthelp/article/what-is-the-inac...

kmlx 2022-01-14 16:32 UTC link
> We immediately engaged legal counsel. PayPal refused to interact with our counsel, and so a C&D was issued. Within one week of the C&D, PayPal did the following:

- Froze the account of our sister company (in Hong Kong), seizing 35k EU

- Froze the personal accounts of all shareholders of the EU and HK corps (~1,5k EU)

- Froze the business accounts of all shareholders by name search (different corporate entities, different businesses) - 5kEU

- Froze the business accounts that the shareholders held (again, different corps, different businesses) - another 5kEU

how can any of this be legal? aren't there laws prohibiting such actions from PayPal?

kragen 2022-01-14 16:32 UTC link
Because they've been doing it since last millennium, and the competing services that didn't steal from their customers went bankrupt because of fraud and reversed payments.
jackson1442 2022-01-14 16:53 UTC link
> In our experiments, disabling PayPal cuts revenue by ~30% in our industries.

I’m curious- have you considered adding other third party gateways (Apple Pay/Amazon Pay/something else)? I personally try to avoid entering my card number, so my general order of precedence is Apple Pay > Amazon Pay > Paypal > card entry.

thebiss 2022-01-14 16:58 UTC link
Before Paypal launched, only companies had relationships with payment processors and could directly accept major credit cards. Individuals had basically nothing.

Paypal was a huge catalyst for online auctions and small business, and it took took time for behavior like this to develop. And as others have said, they worked hard to not be a bank.

shkkmo 2022-01-14 17:42 UTC link
> It was horrible for me, but that's what the says that they had to do, and if they didn't the could end up in trouble with the feds facing huge penalties.

Except that most likely isn't true. The law does not require banks to have your home address. The law does require banks to verify your identity, but there are many ways to do this without requiring a "home address".

The "home address" rule is self-imposed by banks and is yet another way that our country makes life unnecessarily difficult for homeless or itinerant people.

Edit: This is regarding USA law, and I realized I am not where you reside. I assumed USA because of the FDA mention but I realized that was referencing the article so may not be a good clue.

johndough 2022-01-14 17:58 UTC link
"AFAIU" stands for "as far as I understand".

(So those who have never seen this acronym do not have to google for it.)

kweks 2022-01-14 18:14 UTC link
I have (almost) no issue with accounts being frozen. At the end of the day, it's a private company, they can chose if they want to do business with you or not. Likewise, holding for 180 days is aligned with most credit card chargeback limits, so they protect themselves. (There are other ways to go about this, which most other processors handle in a frictionless fashion, ie Stripe).

Having an account frozen is more than annoying, but it's their choice.

However seizing (stealing) funds is completely unacceptable, no matter how it's dressed up. Hell, even if they gave seized funds to charity it'd be slightly more palatable than lining their pockets from proceeds they deemed as "risky".

toast0 2022-01-14 18:14 UTC link
I can recall reading many PayPal horror stories, but as I recall, they were all accounts frozen and then usually closed and paid out 6+months later. This story and others in comments suggest PayPal has decided not to pay out the frozen accounts anymore. Damages from freezing the money for 6 months are real, but may not be realistically legally actionable; damages from not paying the funds are clearly actionable.
mcv 2022-01-14 19:04 UTC link
For over a decade I've heard tons of stories about PayPal freezing accounts for questionable reasons. I've heard of events that were cancelled because the organizers suddenly couldn't access the money people paid to the event, and PayPal wouldn't release the money until they could prove they'd organized the event for which people paid, for which the organizers of course needed that money.

I will never ever use PayPal. Everything I've heard about them makes them sound like an extremely unreliable payment provider.They're not an organization you should trust with your money.

leviathant 2022-01-14 19:13 UTC link
Every time I've read about someone making a fuss about PayPal freezing their account, as you get into the details of their business, it quickly becomes apparent that knowingly or otherwise, they're doing something risky enough that it triggered something related to terms and conditions that they didn't bother to read. I realize that's just my anecdote, but when you're working with money, there's a lot of boring reading you should do. Quickly becomes apparent why that opportunity to fill a seemingly obvious hole in a market isn't the opportunity you thought it was.
stronglikedan 2022-01-14 19:44 UTC link
No sympathy here. They've been steali..err..seizing funds for decades, and dodging the lawsuits by leveraging their clout. Sure, maybe they have some regulations to follow, but they willfully choose to ignore the folks they're stealing from, instead of helping them to understand the process of getting their stolen money back, and prevent money from being stolen from them in the future. I hope they're squeezed hard on this one.
foxfluff 2022-01-14 19:55 UTC link
Yeah... I've been hearing these horror stories about paypal for a very long time now and it makes my blood boil knowing that nothing's ever been done about it. I really hope that a big change is about to happen.
throw10920 2022-01-14 20:16 UTC link
> - Froze the business accounts of all shareholders by name search (different corporate entities, different businesses) - 5kEU

> - Froze the business accounts that the shareholders held (again, different corps, different businesses) - another 5kEU

Shareholders? Not execs, but shareholders?

If true, this is one of the worst things that I have ever seen a company do, and this should probably be the top comment.

Editorial Channel
What the content says
+0.90
Article 17 Property
High Advocacy Framing
Editorial
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SETL
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This is one of the two central themes. The entire lawsuit is framed around PayPal's alleged arbitrary deprivation of property (funds). The article documents specific amounts ($26,984, $42,000+, $172,000+) and emphasizes that these seizures occurred without legal process, court order, or fair justification. This directly supports Article 17's prohibition on arbitrary property deprivation.

+0.80
Article 10 Fair Hearing
High Advocacy Framing
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This is the central theme of the article. The headline itself—'wouldn't even tell them why their funds had been frozen'—frames PayPal's refusal to provide explanation as the primary violation. The complaint explicitly alleges denial of 'any fair or due process.' The article advocates for fair trial/due process rights by documenting their violation.

+0.60
Article 8 Right to Remedy
High Advocacy Framing
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The article centers on PayPal's refusal to provide explanation or access to information, which is framed as denying plaintiffs the remedy process itself. The complaint emphasizes lack of information and inability to challenge the action as the core harm.

+0.50
Article 7 Equality Before Law
High Advocacy Framing
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The article systematically documents unequal application of PayPal's own rules. One plaintiff received contradictory explanations; the complaint alleges PayPal denied plaintiffs 'any fair or due process.' The article frames this as a violation of equal treatment under law.

+0.50
Article 9 No Arbitrary Detention
High Advocacy Framing
Editorial
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The lawsuit complaint explicitly alleges 'widespread business practice of unilaterally seizing funds from its clients' financial accounts, without cause.' The article reports this as the central claim, framing seizure as arbitrary action taken without justification.

+0.40
Preamble Preamble
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Article reports on lawsuit alleging violations of fundamental dignity and fair process. The extensive coverage of plaintiffs' claims and the complaint's language about 'widespread business practice' of seizure 'without cause and without any fair or due process' signals the article's alignment with Preamble principles.

+0.30
Article 1 Freedom, Equality, Brotherhood
Medium Framing
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Article documents differential treatment: one plaintiff received multiple contradictory explanations for account freeze from different PayPal representatives. This unequal treatment and lack of consistent standards reflect failure to honor equal dignity.

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Article 22 Social Security
Medium Framing
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The article reports on plaintiffs' loss of access to funds used for work and business. Lena Evans used PayPal for her eBay business and to manage money for her poker league and non-profit. The loss of funds disrupts economic activity and violates economic security protections.

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Article 3 Life, Liberty, Security
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The article documents seizure of substantial funds ($26,984 to $172,000+) for extended periods (6+ months), which affects the plaintiffs' economic security and stability. This is tangentially related to security of person as it impacts livelihood.

ND
Article 2 Non-Discrimination

ND
Article 4 No Slavery

ND
Article 5 No Torture

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Article 6 Legal Personhood

ND
Article 11 Presumption of Innocence

ND
Article 12 Privacy

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Article 13 Freedom of Movement

ND
Article 14 Asylum

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Article 15 Nationality

ND
Article 16 Marriage & Family

ND
Article 18 Freedom of Thought

ND
Article 19 Freedom of Expression

ND
Article 20 Assembly & Association

ND
Article 21 Political Participation

ND
Article 23 Work & Equal Pay

ND
Article 24 Rest & Leisure

ND
Article 25 Standard of Living

ND
Article 26 Education

ND
Article 27 Cultural Participation

ND
Article 28 Social & International Order

ND
Article 29 Duties to Community

ND
Article 30 No Destruction of Rights

Structural Channel
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No structural elements of the site directly relevant to Preamble.

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Article 1 Freedom, Equality, Brotherhood
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No structural signals relevant.

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Article 3 Life, Liberty, Security
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No structural signals relevant.

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Article 7 Equality Before Law
High Advocacy Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
0.00
SETL
+0.50

No structural signals relevant.

0.00
Article 8 Right to Remedy
High Advocacy Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
0.00
SETL
+0.60

No structural signals relevant.

0.00
Article 9 No Arbitrary Detention
High Advocacy Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
0.00
SETL
+0.50

No structural signals relevant.

0.00
Article 10 Fair Hearing
High Advocacy Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
0.00
SETL
+0.80

No structural signals relevant.

0.00
Article 17 Property
High Advocacy Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
-0.30
SETL
+0.90

No structural signals relevant.

0.00
Article 22 Social Security
Medium Framing
Structural
0.00
Context Modifier
0.00
SETL
+0.30

No structural signals relevant.

ND
Article 2 Non-Discrimination

ND
Article 4 No Slavery

ND
Article 5 No Torture

ND
Article 6 Legal Personhood

ND
Article 11 Presumption of Innocence

ND
Article 12 Privacy

ND
Article 13 Freedom of Movement

ND
Article 14 Asylum

ND
Article 15 Nationality

ND
Article 16 Marriage & Family

ND
Article 18 Freedom of Thought

ND
Article 19 Freedom of Expression

ND
Article 20 Assembly & Association

ND
Article 21 Political Participation

ND
Article 23 Work & Equal Pay

ND
Article 24 Rest & Leisure

ND
Article 25 Standard of Living

ND
Article 26 Education

ND
Article 27 Cultural Participation

ND
Article 28 Social & International Order

ND
Article 29 Duties to Community

ND
Article 30 No Destruction of Rights

Supplementary Signals
Epistemic Quality
0.77
Propaganda Flags
0 techniques detected
Solution Orientation
No data
Emotional Tone
No data
Stakeholder Voice
No data
Temporal Framing
No data
Geographic Scope
No data
Complexity
No data
Transparency
No data
Event Timeline 20 events
2026-02-26 12:20 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 12:18 rate_limit OpenRouter rate limited (429) model=llama-3.3-70b - -
2026-02-26 12:17 rate_limit OpenRouter rate limited (429) model=llama-3.3-70b - -
2026-02-26 12:16 rate_limit OpenRouter rate limited (429) model=llama-3.3-70b - -
2026-02-26 10:21 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:21 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:20 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:18 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:18 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:16 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:16 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:15 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:15 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:14 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:14 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:13 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:13 credit_exhausted Credit balance too low, retrying in 252s - -
2026-02-26 10:13 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
2026-02-26 10:13 credit_exhausted Credit balance too low, retrying in 259s - -
2026-02-26 10:12 dlq Dead-lettered after 1 attempts: PayPal faces lawsuit for freezing customer accounts and funds - -
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build 1686d6e+53hr · deployed 2026-02-26 10:15 UTC · evaluated 2026-02-26 12:13:57 UTC