| Paypal: | | | | to three CEO changes in its first year |
| PayPal is an e-commerce business | | | | of operations. Foreign organized crime |
| allowing payments and money transfers to | | | | rings found ways to steal millions from |
| be made through the internet. It serves | | | | the young company by automatically |
| as an electronic alternative to | | | | registering accounts using stolen |
| traditional paper methods such as checks | | | | identities. To block automated systems |
| and money orders. PayPal performs | | | | from using this form of fraud, PayPal |
| payment processing for online vendors, | | | | devised a system (see Captcha) of making |
| auction sites, and other corporate | | | | the user enter numbers from a blurry |
| users, for which it charges a fee. In | | | | picture; according to Eric M. Jackson, |
| October 2002, PayPal became a wholly | | | | author of the book The PayPal Wars, |
| owned subsidiary of eBay. Their | | | | PayPal invented this system now in |
| corporate headquarters is in San Jose, | | | | common use; though, there is evidence |
| California. | | | | AltaVista used a captcha as early as |
| PayPal account holders must be 16 or | | | | 1997, before PayPal existed.eBay watched |
| over with a debit/credit card or bank | | | | the rise in volume of online payments, |
| account and e-mail address. | | | | and realized its fit with online |
| To Sign Up for Paypal go here: | | | | auctions. But rather than work with |
| Beginnings: | | | | PayPal, eBay purchased a competing |
| PayPal Corp, as it is known today, is | | | | payment service named Billpoint. eBay |
| the result of a March 2000 merger | | | | made Billpoint the official payment |
| between Confinity and X.com[1]. | | | | system of eBay, dubbing it "eBay |
| Confinity was founded in December of | | | | Payments", but cut the functionality of |
| 1998 by Peter Thiel and Max Levchin, | | | | Billpoint by narrowing it to only |
| initially as a Palm Pilot payments and | | | | payments made for eBay auctions. |
| cryptography company[2]. was founded by | | | | For this reason PayPal was listed in |
| Elon Musk in March of 1999, initially as | | | | several times as many auctions as |
| an Internet financial services company. | | | | Billpoint. In February of 2000 there |
| Both companies were located on | | | | were approximately an average of 200,000 |
| University Avenue in Palo Alto. On the | | | | daily auctions advertising the PayPal |
| Confinity business side, many of its | | | | service while Billpoint (in beta) had |
| initial recruits were alumni of The | | | | only 4,000 auctions. By April of 2000 |
| Stanford Review, also founded by Peter | | | | there were more than 1,000,000 auctions |
| Thiel, and most early engineers hailed | | | | promoting the PayPal service. PayPal was |
| from the University of Illinois at | | | | able to turn the corner and become the |
| Urbana-Champaign, recruited by Max | | | | first dot-com to IPO after the September |
| Levchin. On the side, Elon Musk | | | | 11 attacks. |
| recruited a wide range of personnel, | | | | Near the time when PayPal went public |
| many of whom remain at PayPal today, | | | | (first quarter 2002), it filed an |
| such as the current head of product, Amy | | | | anti-competition complaint against eBay |
| Klement [3] and several other members of | | | | on the grounds of using its auction |
| the senior team. | | | | venue to attempt to force PayPal off its |
| Though growing rapidly, PayPal was | | | | site. However, the company eventually |
| losing $10 million a month and was | | | | reconciled with its former rival. |
| fraught with internal turmoil that led | | | | |