They Asked For My Name. I Said No.

I tried to order a new guitar from *bleep* the other day, but it all went wrong.

Sometimes members of the NBTV community write to me with stories of their privacy wins, or their privacy trials and tribulations.

And this one was a doozy that I definitely resonated with.

So it deserved a dramatic reenactment.

First is the shipping address.

I use a PMB and set it up so that I can use a false name to all the things online.

I don't like my name being associated with the things that I buy.

Next is the mailing address.

I used privacy.com to create a virtual card just for this purchase.

The virtual cards don't have to have a name associated with it or an address.

So when it was time to enter my billing details, the form required a name and address to be entered.

I tried to skip those fields, but they were required.

Since the card has no name or address associated with it, I just made up some name and address.

Then of course the checkout process required an email.

So I created an email using simplelogin just for this one purchase, which I will delete or disable as soon as I get my new guitar.

Lastly, a phone number was also required to check out, so I grabbed one of the virtual phone numbers that I have on cloaked.com and I threw it in and hit purchase.

I got an email saying my order has been placed, and I saw that my card was charged and the transaction was settled.

Great.

A few days later, I look at cloaked and there's a voicemail waiting for me.

They tried to leave a message for the made up name that I used on the billing address.

They wanted to confirm that that person did in fact make the order.

I called them back.

Hi. What's the problem?

Who am I speaking with?

Well, this is awkward.

Neither the billing name nor the shipping address name is under my real name.

Do I give them my real name or one of the fake names that I used?

I gave him the name that I put on the shipping address.

It's Jill...Smith.

Well, who's this other person under the billing address?

Oh. That's nobody.

That's just a name I made up.

Silence.

I think I heard him shift the phone to the other ear.

Uh, excuse me.

Nobody?

Nobody. Yep. That's right.

The card that I used to purchase this guitar does not have a name associated with it, but your form field required that I put a name, so I just made up a name. I mean, what would you do?

So there is no such person with that name, but that doesn't matter since the name isn't required to authorize this card transaction.

Well, what about this billing address?

You see, the reason your order was halted is because the billing address and the shipping address don't match.

So our fraud team halted the order to verify the billing address.

Oh, I see.

Well, that address doesn't exist either.

It's also something that I made up.

Again, this card that I use doesn't have any address associated with it yet.

Your form field required that I put something in, so I just made something up.

I don't understand.

How can you have a credit card with no name or address associated with it?

What bank do you use?

Okay, well, first of all, gift cards don't have addresses or names.

Oh, so you used a gift card?

No, I used a virtual card.

I don't understand.

I took a breath.

Listen.

It's 2025.

Credit card theft is at an all time high.

It is not safe to shop online with a credit card that you carry around in your pocket.

How do I know what you're going to do with my card?

Are you going to leave it in a database?

Are you going to sell it to others or let it get exposed in a breach?

It is on me to secure my money.

So I used a virtual card on your side.

I created a single use card just to buy something from your store, which has already settled, and the money has been transferred.

And I'm going to delete the card as soon as I get the guitar.

The service that I used to create this virtual card is privacy.com.

Silence again.

I heard him sigh in frustration.

Then he asked.

So what about this email address?

Is this yours?

Oh. At this point I laughed. Ha ha.

Heh. I made that email just to show up on your site.

I do have access to it, but again, I don't know what you do with the emails that you collect, so I made one that I can destroy when I'm done buying this guitar.

And this phone number?

Is this yours?

I chuckled more because it is very odd to try to confirm my identity that I just made up for this purchase.

I have control and access to that number, but I will discard that soon as well.

He suddenly had a change of spirit.

He had a new plan.

Listen, I'm going to update your billing details with your delivery details, your delivery name and your delivery address.

And I'm going to send this over to the billing team so that they can verify that this is okay.

There's no need to update the billing details.

Just tell them that you spoke to me and everything's okay.

No, they are very strict.

If this does not check out exactly as they want it, they will cancel the order.

The billing and shipping addresses have to match or they reject it.

That sounds a bit redundant, but okay.

You do it the way you want.

Okay, great. Goodbye.

He sounded eager to get off the phone.

Oh. Uh?

Hello?

Hello.

The poor soul had probably never come across someone who cared about their privacy before.

Anyway, the next day, I got word that the guitar had shipped and was on his way.

The moral of the story is that a purchase needs two things: payment and a place to send it.

Use privacy tools that let you control your personal information, so that you don't have to share unnecessary details with the hundreds of merchants that you interact with.

Let's stop treating a shopping cart like a background check and make minimal disclosure the standard.

Privacy is normal, and the more people who use PMBs, aliases, VoIP numbers, and masked cards, the more normal it becomes.

If you'd like to be part of our NBTV members group and hear more fun stories like this one, please visit ludlowinstitute.org/donate.

We are funded entirely by community support, so help us shift culture around privacy.

And if you wanted to pick up any cool merch along the way, visit shop.nbtv.media.

By the way, if you wanted to try out any of the tools mentioned in this video for making email aliases, VoIP numbers, masked cards, I've linked them in the description, and we've also covered them in all kinds of other videos and articles.

None of them are sponsors of the show.

We don't actually have any show sponsors.

They're just tools that I also use, and they can be super useful if you're trying to protect your privacy online.