What you're agreeing to

PayPal's User Agreement includes provisions allowing PayPal to hold funds, limit accounts, and reverse transactions. PayPal can restrict or permanently limit your account if it suspects policy violations, which can leave your money inaccessible for up to 180 days.

Privacy in plain English

PayPal collects your financial transaction history, device information, and browsing behavior within its apps. PayPal shares data with advertising partners and has shifted toward monetizing purchase history through its advertising network.

Terms of Service: Breakdown

Concerning Clauses

• - PayPal can freeze your account and hold your balance for up to 180 days if it suspects policy violations.
• PayPal's arbitration clause prevents class-action lawsuits; all disputes must be resolved individually.
• PayPal can change its User Agreement with 30 days notice and continued use counts as acceptance.

Data Sharing

• - PayPal shares transaction and behavioral data with its advertising partners through PayPal Ads.
• PayPal's data is shared with Venmo (also owned by PayPal) and integrated financial services.

Known Incidents

• - 2022: PayPal disclosed a credential stuffing breach affecting 35,000 accounts, exposing names, Social Security numbers, and transaction histories.
• 2023: PayPal updated its terms to allow sharing customer shopping data with advertisers, prompting significant user backlash.

Privacy Policy: Breakdown

Privacy Issues

• - PayPal tracks your online shopping behavior beyond PayPal transactions using its tracking cookie on merchant websites.
• PayPal uses your financial history to build a behavioral profile shared with data partners.

Who Gets Your Data

• - PayPal's advertising network shares transaction data with brands to target you based on your purchases. - Venmo, a PayPal subsidiary, shares user data with PayPal for combined profiling.

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