PayPal began attacking Apple Pay on social media on Monday, and an early investor in the payment platform is firing back.
PayPal's ad is pointed. The "safer than our selfies" bit is a direct reference to the recent iCloud hacking scandal.
Keith Rabois — a member of the so-called "PayPal Mafia" — took to Twitter to shame PayPal over its new ads:
@sarahcuda dumbest move in the history of the company, and maybe business history.
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014
Quick quiz: Which company suffers more account take-overs via phishing and other abuses, Apple or PayPal?
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014The Quick Quiz continued:
Quick Quiz II: Is Apple more capable of destroying PayPal w/ advertising (and $30 b annual profits) or PayPal ads inflict damage on Apple?
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014
Quiz III: Does PayPal or Apple still have LIVE webpages coded in 1999 that have not been upgraded security wise?
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014
Quiz IV: Who has a brand that Americans love and who has a brand Americans dislike?
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014Rabois decried PayPal's scare tactics:
PayPal ad campaign: We will terrify those users into staying with us for another decade.
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014
Ironically, the most vulnerable 1999 webpages LIVE at PayPal today relate to password recovery flows.
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014To illustrate Rabois' point with a topical example:
Would the NBA run an ad attacking the NFL's issues with domestic violence?
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014And a final nail-in-the-coffin remark about eBay, PayPal's parent company:
eBay which had 145 MILLION accounts compromised recently is running ad campaigns against Apple which had a handful of accounts compromised.
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) September 16, 2014SEE ALSO: iCloud Now Has The Important Security Feature Apple Promised Would Help Protect Your Data