privacy.com cards and prepaid Visa/Mastercard I believe let you enter any address of your choice. Of course, privacy.com would still know and some vendors might be a bit more restrictive, especially towards the prepaid cards in recent years.
Long time ago, you could sign up for ebay under any name + PO box.
I did that, and I had sth like 8 (?) years of frequent buying and selling with 100% top feedback scores as a buyer and seller. I literally never had a single feedback that wasn’t the best rating.
Then, Ebay went all in on KYC, and my PO box and not-my-real-name triggered an account suspension unless I sent them a copy of my photo ID. Despite 100’s of transactions. All made in good faith. With zero probs.
But I can’t single out Ebay. All the big online markets go this way now. I get it, they have to protect against fraud and abuse. But holy shit. I had 8+ yrs of good faith transactions. I’m not a gd frauster.
Weird, I know, but no. You can’t have effeftove e-commerce really without the buyer and seller knowing each other without the use of middlemen who’ll raise costs and wind up knowing more about both parties than they’d have found out about each other the old fashioned way.
If you want to buy anonymously, you have to do it with cash, in person.
Big retailers may have options for local pickup. Amazon has delivery boxes, local pickup from store is available in bestbuy, home depot, Microcenter… I think you can pick up Walmart purchases in stores too (not sure about this one). But unless there is a delivery box they may ask for ID.
Or, a USPS PO box, as others suggested. You can rent one in person, pay cash, but they will require your personal information anyway. But that allows you to break the direct tracking - seller will not know your address, and in general they don’t need to know your real name. I receive packages on fake names via po box no problem. The problem can happen if USPS will lose your package. I guess returns or warranty calls may become more complicated…
P.O. Box is good advice, blind boxes are better, not being a paranoid schizophrenic and recognizing that you exist and interactions with other entities prove your existence is even better than that.
Possibly best is just making a deal where you have packages delivered to your neighbor in exchange for mowing their lawn or something.
How will you pay without providing the address for credit card validation?
privacy.com cards and prepaid Visa/Mastercard I believe let you enter any address of your choice. Of course, privacy.com would still know and some vendors might be a bit more restrictive, especially towards the prepaid cards in recent years.
I tried to sign up for privacy.com once and they demanded a copy of my photo ID. They wanted me to send it to a 3rd party ID verification service.
I didn’t wanna give out a scanned copy of my DL. Which in hindsight feels like a good choice -> krebsonsecurity.com/…/fbi-probes-service-selling-…
If you are not very private already, they may not require that. But if you are, they’ll punt you to an identity broker service before you can sign up.
Ahh, neat. Yeah, some vendors do check the address. Ones that don’t end up paying more per transaction to cover the increased fraud.
yeah, I often some address like the simpsons family, or 85 Albert Embankment, Vauxhall, Lambeth, London, UK for Mr. Bond
Xmrbazaar.com
Long time ago, you could sign up for ebay under any name + PO box.
I did that, and I had sth like 8 (?) years of frequent buying and selling with 100% top feedback scores as a buyer and seller. I literally never had a single feedback that wasn’t the best rating.
Then, Ebay went all in on KYC, and my PO box and not-my-real-name triggered an account suspension unless I sent them a copy of my photo ID. Despite 100’s of transactions. All made in good faith. With zero probs.
But I can’t single out Ebay. All the big online markets go this way now. I get it, they have to protect against fraud and abuse. But holy shit. I had 8+ yrs of good faith transactions. I’m not a gd frauster.
sad i hope this stops being the dfalt (
Weird, I know, but no. You can’t have effeftove e-commerce really without the buyer and seller knowing each other without the use of middlemen who’ll raise costs and wind up knowing more about both parties than they’d have found out about each other the old fashioned way.
If you want to buy anonymously, you have to do it with cash, in person.
I’d either rent a PO box or use those Amazon pickup locations
Big retailers may have options for local pickup. Amazon has delivery boxes, local pickup from store is available in bestbuy, home depot, Microcenter… I think you can pick up Walmart purchases in stores too (not sure about this one). But unless there is a delivery box they may ask for ID.
Or, a USPS PO box, as others suggested. You can rent one in person, pay cash, but they will require your personal information anyway. But that allows you to break the direct tracking - seller will not know your address, and in general they don’t need to know your real name. I receive packages on fake names via po box no problem. The problem can happen if USPS will lose your package. I guess returns or warranty calls may become more complicated…
P.O. Box is good advice, blind boxes are better, not being a paranoid schizophrenic and recognizing that you exist and interactions with other entities prove your existence is even better than that.
Possibly best is just making a deal where you have packages delivered to your neighbor in exchange for mowing their lawn or something.