There are a lot of different payment platforms you can use to send other people money, though one of the most popular ones in the US is Venmo. That said, the app also receives a lot of criticism from its users regarding security concerns.
Those concerns might have been made all the more valid with this story. Strap in to read up on all the details—this one's a bit of a doozy to break down.
Did Biden Delete His Venmo Account After It Was Found?
The New York Times published a feature on the life of current US president Joe Biden in the White House around mid-May. In the article, the publication briefly mentioned that Biden recently sent some money to his grandchildren via Venmo.
This led to a search for Biden's Venmo account, conducted by the curious folks over at BuzzFeed News. After a mere ten minutes, they found it using only "a combination of the app’s built-in search tool and public friends feature" to look it up.
Not only that, but BuzzFeed claims to have also found nearly a dozen Biden family members (inclusive of the president's children and grandchildren), a number of senior White House officials, and all of their contacts on Venmo.
After the discoveries were made, all friends on Biden's friends list were removed. BuzzFeed reached out to a White House spokesperson for a comment, but did not hear back.
A few more hours passed, and the Venmo accounts of the president and his first lady, Jill Biden, disappeared. We don't know if Biden took down his account himself, or if the White House or Venmo took it down on his behalf.
Venmo's Lackluster Security and What Might Change After This Incident
BuzzFeed's feature refers to Venmo's security as a "privacy nightmare for everyone." That comes across as an opinioned statement, but maybe it's becoming a fact.
Privacy advocates at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and Mozilla expressed their worries about how insecure the PayPal-owned app as early as August 2019. At the time, they even published an open letter to Venmo.
Thankfully, Venmo isn't just ignoring these concerns. After BuzzFeed published its fascinating tale on the search for Biden's account, a Venmo spokesperson came forward with the following statement:
The safety and privacy of all Venmo users and their information is always a top priority, and we take this responsibility very seriously. Customers always have the ability to make their transactions private and determine their own privacy settings in the app. We’re consistently evolving and strengthening the privacy measures for all Venmo users to continue to provide a safe, secure place to send and spend money.
It's a very standard corporate response, but hopefully this means the developers will soon add the option to make your friends list private, amongst other security upgrades.
Image Credit: Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons