Coinbase says hackers bribed staff to steal customer data, demanding $20M ransom

You can do a background check, but the reality of the matter is that you pay citizens a living wage to do the work instead of offshore it into a country that pays pennies.

Bank tellers can take thousands out of the vault at any time and yet it seems it’s not a very big issue.

Bank tellers are constantly surveilled by cameras, security guards, and several-times-daily cash counting, and it's still easy to find accounts of them having stolen significant amounts of money before getting caught. These are all from within the last year:

Vannia Chatt: https://6abc.com/post/former-citizens-bank-teller-accused-st...

Karen Farrell Tigler: https://www.irs.gov/compliance/criminal-investigation/former...

Stephanie Rose Kilbert: https://people.com/bank-teller-stole-money-while-pretending-...

Derek Aut: https://www.justice.gov/usao-ma/pr/former-bank-teller-arrest... https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/03/28/boston...

Mountee Brown: https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/pr/maryland-bank-teller-plea...

Being US citizens doesn't make people incorruptible. In fact, many other countries are less corrupt than the US. Someone in this very thread reports having witnessed bank tellers getting bribed in one of those countries: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43996765

I've been through a background check designed to screen out people who were vulnerable to bribery. They interviewed my friends and family from the previous several years to find out if I was secretly gay, cheated on my wife, gambled, drank too much, used illegal drugs, or had money problems for some other reason. It took about a year. I think it would be hard for a financial institution to be economically competitive doing that kind of thing with their call-center workers, because their customers can't tell if they're secure or not, just how much their services cost.

Then shift liability and let the insurers take care of it.

With a lot of this online stuff, no matter who gets your password or access to your account it’s you who has to take care of it. Whereas if the bank teller steals from the till it’s not your problem.

> you pay citizens a living wage to do the work instead of offshore

But what about the capital class? How will they afford more yachts? So sad. They're.. um... job creators or something. Anyway, that's what Fox News told me.

I suggest following the links I provided, which clearly demonstrate that the comment you posted in reply to them is false.

Bank tellers do steal money from the banks they work for though and banks invest a significant amount of resources and have a lot of policies to prevent it.

For example at many banks the teller might need to get manager approval for some cash withdrawals, even for seemingly smaller amounts of money. Despite what it may seem, it's not because of some distrust towards the client but a safeguard against internal fraud.

Loss prevention is a big deal for employees, not just customers. People steal stuff from their employers ALL the time.