Full title that doesn't fit in the HN headline:
"Mastercard deflects blame for NSFW games being taken down, but Valve says payment processors 'specifically cited' a Mastercard rule about damaging the brand"
(For the people who don't click the link to read the article.)
It was Mastercard's rule, but any one of the companies in the payment network could have brought it up to Valve. The whole system is set up so one transaction has to go through up to 6 different companies, and they all have to abide by each other's rules. The US Internet Preservation Society explained it recently:
>Each of these companies maintains its own terms of service and each of them can block a transaction by themselves. Additionally, intermediary companies that handle card transactions are mutually and individually bound to the terms of every Card Network, so even if you never do business with Discover or American Express, you must still obey their rules if you want to accept Visa or Mastercard. For online businesses, there are no alternatives: you will do exactly what they want, or you will not do business at all.
>If you are banned from processing payments, you will not be informed why or by which point of failure. "Risk management" is considered a trade secret in the industry. You have no right to know, you cannot sue to discover what has happened, and you also have no right to appeal.
https://usips.org/blog/2025/07/fair-access-to-banking/
I'd be interesting to know if Valve is big enough to start their own payment system. Yea, I know it would be hard but their customers have libraries of games in their system and Valve has lots of good will. Valve could also offer discounts ($X off if you use ValvePay). It would take years. They'd have to drop the adult games now, start ValvePay, promote it until the majority of their customers used it. Then put the games back and tell Visa and MC they can eff-off.
Simpler: why can't I buy nsfw games with a regular dumb bank transaction (SEPA €) in my case?
If MasterCard/Visa don't want these transactions, stupid, their loss. But at least let me use a payment method that works & doesn't have these morale restrictions?
Or even a Plausible Deniability system - you can't buy these games with currency, you have to use tokens. Here's a token store where you can buy tokens with your currency.
> was Mastercard's rule, but any one of the companies in the payment network could have brought it up to Valve
Did Mastercard threaten Valve? Or did Valve precomply?
Valve's payment processors told Valve they would withdraw payment processing unless Valve banned specific categories of game from their online store.
The payment processors did not cite any law; Valve selling those games was not illegal. Instead they cited Mastercard's rules, which say that they cannot submit transactions that Mastercard believe might damage Mastercard's goodwill or reflect negatively on its brand. Those rules also say Mastercard has sole discretion as to what it considers breach these rules, and Mastercard gives a list of what it deems unacceptable:
https://www.mastercard.us/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/n...
> 5.12.7 Illegal or Brand-damaging Transactions
> A Merchant must not submit to its Acquirer, and a Customer must not submit to the Interchange System, any Transaction that is illegal, or in the sole discretion of the Corporation, may damage the goodwill of the Corporation or reflect negatively on the Marks.
> The Corporation considers any of the following activities to be in violation of this Rule:
> 2. The sale of a product or service, including an image, which is patently offensive and lacks serious artistic value (such as, by way of example and not limitation, images of nonconsensual sexual behavior, sexual exploitation of a minor, nonconsensual mutilation of a person or body part, and bestiality), or any other material that the Corporation deems unacceptable to sell in connection with a Mark.
The payment processors threatened Valve first. Mastercard doesn't need to threaten Valve or even contact them at all to force its will on them: it just needs to threaten its payment processors, the same outcome is achieved. Valve did not remove games from sale until threatened. If they did not do that, and instead initiated some kind of fightback, they would most likely find themselves completely removed from all payment processors, with no recourse. If you want to call that "precompliance", so be it.
> Valve's payment processors told Valve they would withdraw payment processing unless Valve banned specific categories of game from their online store
Do we have a statement from Valve saying as much?
Click on the article link at the top of this page and find out. Let me quote the article for you:
> In a statement provided to PC Gamer, Valve said that it had tried to work things out with Mastercard directly prior to removing the games, and suggested that Mastercard did have at least an indirect influence on the outcome.
> "Mastercard did not communicate with Valve directly, despite our request to do so," a Valve representative said. "Mastercard communicated with payment processors and their acquiring banks. Payment processors communicated this with Valve, and we replied by outlining Steam’s policy since 2018 of attempting to distribute games that are legal for distribution.
> "Payment processors rejected this, and specifically cited Mastercard’s Rule 5.12.7 and risk to the Mastercard brand."
This text is also consistent with Valve making a determination, checking with payment processors and not being told no. (Versus the payment processors reaching out to Valve first.)
Like yes, there is a problem with Mastercard. But I want to know this isn’t Valve having complied with some activists trying to cover their tracks.
If this is just evil old Valve, why did itch.io - a site founded on openness and the right to sell adult-only games, especially if they cover LGBT themes, tell everyone that their payment processors also want them not to offer adult-only games?
Which is more likely:
1. Porn-hating, sex-hating, LGBT-hating activist group from Australia bombards Mastercard with complaints that Valve and Itch are selling adult games. Mastercard reminds its payment processors not to bring shame on The Mark. Valve's and Itch's payment processors tell them not to sell adult games.
2. Porn-hating, sex-hating, LGBT-hating activist group from Australia bombards Mastercard with complaints that Valve and Itch are selling adult games. Valve and Itch agree with these harpies and remove their revenue streams and support for developers (because they hate revenue and hate supporting their developers; they'd much rather align with moral prudes from Australia in order to lose money and abandon the people who make them that money), then they sneakily pin the blame on Mastercard. Valve and Itch also use telepathy to know Collective Shout's desires, which they agree with, to ban games precisely at the time Collective Shout are calling up Mastercard, in order for it to be Collective Shout -> Valve/Itch rather than Collective Shout -> Mastercard -> Payment processors -> Valve/Itch
> why did itch.io - a site founded on openness and the right to sell adult-only games, especially if they cover LGBT themes, tell everyone that their payment processors also want them not to offer adult-only games?
Thank you, this is the context I was missing.
What is more likely is the processors made the decision themselves and cited Mastercard's rule without interacting with Mastercard.
If Mastercard cared about this stuff then processors like CCBill wouldn't exist. The absurd amount of money that porn brings in on the internet would dry up over night.
This was a decision made by paysafe and paypall and so far they are the only ones not getting the blame pinned on them.
Itch: Our processors told us to do it.
Mastercard: That is correct, we weren't involved.
Half of Hacker News: MASTERCARD AND VISA!!!!!!
The other half: VALVE AND ITCH!!!!!!
Paysafe and Paypall: Lol
> What is more likely is the processors made the decision themselves
If you think that, please explain how the payment processors didn't say anything since Valve started selling adult games in 2018... and only a few days after Collective Shout specifically started targeting MasterCard and Visa (not PayPal or Paysafe)... the payment processors used by Valve cited MasterCard's rules to Valve?
It's also MasterCard that set the rules. Valve can always get another payment processor. They can't get another payment processor that is not beholden to Visa and/or MasterCard.
Mastercard doesn't care.
Payment processors that handle adult material exist but they charge a premium rate. These companies could switch to CCBill as quick as they could code it up. Exactly the same as what OnlyFans did. They would have to explain to their entire customer base across the board why they have to charge more though.
Also, look at https://www.collectiveshout.org/open-letter-to-payment-proce...
They absolutely targeted paysafe and paypall. Paypall was the very first on their list, I wonder why that is. They knew the processor is the weak link.
After 10 years in the POS industry, I can assure you it came from their processor. The only card network I have ever seen take action like this is AMEX and they have have separate processing. Processors involve themselves in their customers' business constantly for risk assessment. Collective action like this is enough to make them ask, "Should we treat this as a video game vendor or as adult industry?" It's that simple to tip the scale.
Also, it doesn't make sense that Itch did it themselves. Why would they throw their vendors under the bus instead of just pulling the titles? Or are we supposed to believe they facilitated collective shout just to pull a couple of low value titles? I can't see any angle here that doesn't border on conspiracy.
> They absolutely targeted paysafe and paypall
OK, I read the link. They targeted Paysafe and PayPal AND VISA AND MASTERCARD AND DISCOVER AND JCB. All of them, in no particular order. Why did you not mention those?
Why are Valve's and Itch's payment processors, instead of citing their own policies, citing MasterCard's policies?
If "MasterCard doesn't care" then section 5.12.7 "Illegal or Brand-damaging Transactions" of MasterCard's rules, that specifically lists out transactions MasterCard prohibit processors from performing, specifically citing the percieved risk to MasterCard's brand... that's a really weird way for MasterCard to say they "don't care" about those exact sorts of transactions, which Valve's payment processors have been facilitating for Valve since 2018... until now, when a media campaign has put them and MasterCard, Visa, Discover and JCB on blast.
If MasterCard "doesn't care", let them show it by completely removing section 5.12.17 of their own rules. They made those rules, and those rules say they care, no matter how much you say they don't.
Ok, I'll assume good faith and answer that. I didn't mention those because you weren't questioning them. I feel that is kind of obvious.
>(not PayPal or Paysafe)...
As to paypal's policy...
https://www.paypal.com/us/cshelp/article/what-is-paypal%E2%8...
>We don't permit PayPal account holders to buy or sell: Sexually oriented digital goods or content delivered through a digital medium. Examples of digital goods include downloadable pictures or videos and website subscriptions.
Yeah it's a good question, why would they cite mastercard instead of their own policy?
It's entirely anecdotal, but in my 10 years of experience dealing with a multitude of processors and payment gateways... that's what processors do. Their very first instinct is to make things someone else's problem. With maybe the exception of First Data, this has held up consistently for me. Of course a lot of our high dollar business was through First Data so who knows what other people's experience is.
You are still completely avoiding the fact that processors that can handle this stuff exist. Sure Mastercard should probably change their rule, but that isn't going to change the situation.
That is why Itch is looking at their options:
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/itchio-are-seeking-out-new-...
So the question is, could both Valve and Itch take on several payment processors, and choose which game on their store goes through which processor? Or would porn-shy processors have blanket rules saying your whole company can't have any porn in the same store, even if it's locked away, even if you use not-us to process payments for it?
And secondly, let's say Valve moves to a porn-friendly processor (Itch has said it's looking for one, not that it's found one). MasterCard clearly has a rule, right there in black and white, saying don't facilitate this particular type of porn. How do you think it will look if for any potential processor, and MasterCard, if Valve switches processor and continues accepting MasterCard payments for games in direct contravention of MasterCards's given rule, while the world's press, and the angry lobby group, is watching?
As far as it goes, collective shout claimed Valve didn't respond to them and that's why they complained to MC visa about it. They even mention how many calls they made to them to get the complaint heard.
So everyone would have to be pretty invested in this show for it to have originated from Valve?
Which means Collective Shout didn't have any legal weight behind their demands.
They're based out of Australia and so have the Australian porn laws behind them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pornography_in_Australia#Illeg...
> Some types of pornography (both real and fictitious) are technically illegal in Australia and if classified would be rated RC and therefore banned in Australia. This includes any pornography depicting violent BDSM, incest, paedophilia, zoophilia, certain extreme fetishes (such as golden showers) and/or indicators of youth (such as wearing a school uniform).
https://www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au/blog/pornography-la...
https://www.kptlegal.com.au/resources/knowledge/pornography-...
Steam already has the ability to block certain countries and regions from buying specific products. IIRC many of the adult games were already banned in the German region for example.
If it was about the laws, at worst Valve could block Australian users from buying adult content and that would be it.
... and if Valve and Itch had blocked content that was illegal in Australia before Collective Shout weaponized the Australian laws, we wouldn't have heard about it beyond it showing up in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_banned_video_games_in_...
From the Valve rules:
1. Everything on your banned list that Steam sells was already banned in Australia (you can tell by looking it up on SteamDB and noticing it has "n/a" for the Australian price e.g. https://steamdb.info/app/2456420/)
2. Collective Shout aren't weaponising Australian laws in this case - those only apply in Australia. At best they could get games banned in Australia by drawing the state censor's attention to them. What Collective Shout did was weaponise American corporations fear of negative publicity by calling them repeatedly and threatening them with negative campaigning, and as a result got games banned in countries they don't live in, over and above the say-so of the people who do live in those countries, and the laws of those countries allowing them to purchase such games.
Of course - they've never invoked a legal justification. What they seem to be leaning on is basically "we can create bad press about you supporting payments for X", promising headlines like "MasterCard is paying for women to be beaten and raped!" or other sensational nonsense.
Mastercard pressured their processors and the processors turned around and talked to Valve about it and cited Mastercard's rules. It wasn't pre-compliance, but there was a proxy that allows Mastercard to deflect responsibility.
An intermediary between Valve and Mastercard likely was the one that brought it up because they have to comply with those rules, or the rules of someone upstream of them that has to and imports them into their own rules, so they have to interpret vague "brand damage" rules and they err to the conservative side because if they run afoul of the rules they could lose access to process Mastercard transactions ~20% of US transactions, which would really mean losing most of their customers not just the 20% of Mastercard flows.
As I understand it, Valve was threatened by a middleman because the middleman precomplied with Mastercard.
Both Valve and Itch use Paysafe and Paypall for processing. I'm glad someone is paying attention.
I feel I've been screaming at a wall for a week now. All this rage and it's all directed at the wrong corporations.
They cite a rule about Mastercard brand damage. If Mastercard didn't specify that such content would result in MC brand damage why would they cite it rather than their own rules?
Some options:
a) they are worried Mastercard might randomly decide it does and punish them
b) it's convenient to be able to blame someone else
c) someone somewhere said something and the rest of the orgs isn't aware or over-interpreted a statement
Vague rules like this are great to dilute responsibility. It can both be true that Mastercard didn't tell the payment processors to force the issue and that the payment processors strongly thought they had to.
There are definitely a lot of links in this chain. Maybe leafo can chime-in and say exactly what happened with Itch.io. But I suspect that someone downstream of Visa/Mastercard anticipated that the payment card companies would not permit the transactions and relayed that back up to the merchants, and they shut it off preemptively.
But it's hard to say. Mastercard is now saying that they never said or did anything. So where did the outrage come from? Someone must have done something.
> But I suspect that someone downstream of Visa/Mastercard anticipated that the payment card companies would not permit the transactions and relayed that back up to the merchants, and they shut it off preemptively.
It sure is tragic that benevolent and majestic Mastercard is having their name thrown into the mud over this. Coincidentally, it sure is convenient that they have a number of middleman scapegoats who can take the blame on their behalf.
All Mastercard has to do is say “We ordered payment processors to let Valve sell their games”. It is sure convenient that they stop at “We didn’t say the opposite.”
FWIW Mastercard are simply lying, as anyone who has ever had to touch adult payment processing will tell you.
There's even a (non-public) list of keyword banned terms.
Indeed, and the keywords are vague and they refuse to rigorously define them. Adult payment processors just run around in the dark until they trip over one of these landmines.
Even the (rare) categories of content that have been legally determined to be non-obscene (e.g., werewolf erotica [1]) can fall under banned keywords (in this case, “bestiality”).
It’s a stupid extralegal system and ought to be destroyed.
[1] https://time.com/archive/7118599/california-prisoner-fights-...
Throughout this our only contacts have been representatives at Stripe and PayPal. They indicated that they got a notice and kicked off their own audit.
As far as I'm aware, the Collective Shout letter caused a "formal card network inquiry" to originate from both Mastercard and Visa. I did not have access to the actual inquiry, but my assumption is that it wasn't "we see this content, take it down" and more like "we saw this letter, look into whats going on before we do our own investigation and fine you"