Manhattan DA issues dire warning to Venmo, PayPal and other payment app users

Published 3:00 pm Tuesday, January 23, 2024

TheStreet’s J.D. Durkin brings the latest business headlines from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange as markets close for trading Tuesday, January 23rd.

Full Video Transcript Below:

J.D. DURKIN: I’m J.D. Durkin reporting from the New York Stock Exchange. Stocks were mixed to close out today’s session. The Dow closed down 95 points, the Nasdaq closed four tenths of a percent higher, and the S&P closed two tenths of a percent higher.

This comes as investors continue to monitor fourth-quarter earnings reports. Over 10 percent of companies in the S&P 500 have reported results, and of those, 62 percent have beaten Wall Street expectations.

In other news, if you send money using apps like Venmo, PayPal, Cash App, or Zelle, Manhattan’s District Attorney has a warning for you: be careful. In a letter he sent to the popular apps, D.A. Alvin Bragg demanded that more security measures be installed to protect users from theft, and in some cases, physical harm.

In the letter, Bragg stated, “Offenders also take over the phone’s security by changing passwords, recovery accounts, and application settings. The ease with which offenders can collect five- and even six-figure windfalls in a matter of minutes is incentivizing a large number of individuals to commit these crimes.”

Bragg also referenced Senator Elizabeth Warren’s letter to the banking industry from 2022, which said fraud claims had tripled between 2020 and 2022.

To combat the rising crimes, Bragg suggested safety measures such as lowering the limit of daily transfers, longer wait time for larger transfers, and having a confirmation sent for when a suspicious transfer takes place.

Peer-to-peer payment apps like Venmo and PayPal now handle an estimated one trillion dollars in payments.

That’ll do it for your daily briefing. From the New York Stock Exchange, I’m J.D. Durkin with TheStreet.

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