Total tangent here… austrailians don’t have credit cards? Tell me more, I am very curious.
Comment on Australia says platforms like Steam and Roblox have 'significant' child safety gaps
caseofthematts@lemmy.world 2 days ago
For anyone that doesn’t know, currently because of stuff like this, people in Australia can’t even access their Steam games that they’ve already bought unless they have a credit card, which I’ve learned most people over there don’t. Valve isn’t allowing the third-party ‘steal your data’ options like face scan and government ID, so Australian folk without a CC are out of luck.
Australians, please fight back against these anyi-privacy laws. If these are successful, they’ll come to other countries.
Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world 2 days ago
dev_null@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
Credit cards are mostly a US thing. Most other places you just use debit cards.
Credit cards are of course used worldwide but most people don’t own one and those who do use it rarely, since why would you borrow money to pay for something unless it’s an emergency or some big / long term thing (at which point an actual loan is probably better, so again CC not needed).
hanrahan@slrpnk.net 6 hours ago
what ? im Aussie and im 60 I’ve been using credit cards as an Aussie for 35 years or so.
I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have a credit card, i have 3 with a $0 balance that are paid off automatically monthly (I use 1 exclusively and the others are backups). I earn a extra month of income in a HISA and get JB HiFi and Woolies/Coles gift cards as rewards. I also have 5 debit cards because they give them out like candy every time you open an account somewhere and never use any of them at all, aside from one occasionally at the ATM.
dev_null@lemmy.ml 6 hours ago
I said “mostly a US thing” for a reason! Australia is definitely one of places where credit cards are more common. Still, from what I checked now, only around 50% of adults in Australia own a credit card, let alone use one.
In US they are popular becase they give lots of rewards (which may be the case in Australia, you definitely know better than me). These rewards come from charging credit card fees to merchants. In the EU the law protects merchants from unreasonable credit card fees, and without charging fees, there are no rewards. And without rewards, there is no point in using a credit card day to day - leaving it only for emergencies, etc.
boonhet@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
At least in my corner of the world, debit cards can be used anywhere online that requires credit cards, but at least some banks disable it by default so you have to enable online payments. 15 -20 years ago it was different and you HAD to have a credit card to buy shit off Amazon or Steam so most kids couldn’t get shit.
Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Debit cards make sense. Though I would expect those to be usable as CCs for the verification part.
dev_null@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
I’m not sure the reason, but my guess is that a child can own a debit card, but can’t own a credit card.
Dvixen@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Not in the same sense as North America. We have debit cards tied to bank accounts with a similar functionality as a credit card, but they often don’t work at a negative balance. No one I know has a debit card that functions the same as a North American credit card. (I’m a Canadian living in Australia.)
I have a MasterCard debit card, but it doesn’t work as an age verification for Steam.
caseofthematts@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I’m not an expert, I’m just being told this from an Australian. They do have credit cards, but it’s not as much a necessity to do things as it is in North America. So, from what I’m told, a lot of adults don’t have one.
VerdantTome@programming.dev 1 day ago
Australians absolutely have credit cards. The previous poster seems to be getting their information from a single Aussie in some sort of echo chamber.
I couldn’t find numbers specifically for the percentage of people who have at least one card, but the total number of CC accounts indicates that it’s likely that almost every working adult has one. That being said, credit card usage is low compared to other countries, I suspect because the government made the banks get together and create a universal electronic payment network in the 1980s, and we’ve all been used to paying virtually anywhere with our regular ATM cards, direct from our normal bank accounts, for decades. Credit cards are primarily used for, y’know, credit, and not just everyday transactions.
Side note: I live overseas from where I grew up, and I frequently run into fellow (usually young) immigrants who will confidently tell the locals half-truths and outright falsehoods about their home countries based on their limited experience with the world. Living with one small group of people in one part of one town doesn’t give you a full understanding of everyone in your whole country.
caseofthematts@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I just want to be clear, no where did I say that Australians didn’t have credit cards. What my post meant to say is that it’s not as common to have a credit card like it is in North America (basically a necessity if you want to get a car, apartment house, etc).
This person that I got the information from was very up in arms about this.
My whole point wasn’t even about the credit cards. It’s about the anti-privacy laws.
hanrahan@slrpnk.net 6 hours ago
im an Aussie and I don’t know anyone who is an adult with a job who doesn’t have a credit card. I mean it doesn’t come up in conversation that often, so I am sure there are folks i know without one though.
Solemarc@lemmy.world 1 day ago
You are completely wrong.
Credit cards are very common here. Also, I don’t have a credit card and I haven’t lost access to any of my steam games.
I’ve played games like Wuthering Waves and VPN’d to America and the game has asked me to verify my age then I’ve disabled the VPN and started the game again and magically it’s not now.
blackbirdbiryani@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I’ll chime in to say that I’m an Australian and on the flipside I don’t know anyone with an actual credit card (not debit). So yeah you’re also making a sweeping generalisation.
Also none of my debit cards work around the steam requirements, it depends on which bank you’re with.
caseofthematts@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I don’t know what to tell you, I got my information from an Australian, and everything I’ve seen online confirms this.