My wild guess: Is everyone now just using apps for every single little thing? So now using the mobile site is considered “fraud behavior” and using apps is “normal”? Like is this what their “fraud detection system” do now?
Like the same card works when you order it at the counter in store… why did the site reject it? it literally worked before on that same site…
Tries a bunch of different cards, also declines…
But those same cards do work on other sites…
Like…
I feel like when you
- Use their app
and - Create an account
you’re less likely to face problems…
But using mobile website + guest checkout is very likely to get flagged for some stupid reason…
I personally believe it is on purpose, to try and get you to download the app.
Then they can get way more of your data to sell.
I’m gonna have to agree. It’s been a growing trend for years and most sites don’t even give you half the features on the site.
The other day I went to place an order for a pizza on the Dominos website on my phone and it would crash every time I tried. Went to my PC and it worked perfectly first try. I’m not downloading your fucking app when I only eat your food, like, once a year.
It gets even better. Load it on your mobile in desktop view, and watch how it miraculously works without issues.
It’s more about ads than data. It’s much more difficult for the average person to block ads on an app than on a website.
To add to this, I think this is why so many “smart” appliances/products have companion apps (I speak from my own thoughts so I don’t use certain language).
For example, we had a perfectly good, ordinary air fryer (which is essentially just a miniature convection oven). But, my dad got a “smart” air fryer with WiFi connectivity and a companion app. All it really does is allow for remote control and send notifications when your food is done cooking, but you should not be leaving these things unattended to begin with, so the app’s usefulness is questionable at best.
I have a sneaking suspicion that much of this is done to enable data collection. For example, they could hypothetically learn how frequently you use it and when, and then silently track your browsing history to suggest sponsored recipes. They could also have deals with other companies who are more specifically interested in user data. It’s yet another avenue for data extraction.
I personally would not download these companion apps. They’re generally not necessary and if they are, there’s often an alternative product that does not require it. I’m of the opinion that an air fryer does not need an Internet connection. I feel that if remote accessibility was the true purpose, there should be an ability to access the device over a local network, rather than going through a server somewhere else.
99% of the internet is trash. Pages bouncing all over while loading, constant cookie or login popups (even with various blockers), links not connecting, old long outdated content being pushed to the front of searches, junk AI slop non-answers articles or marketing lists about a problem vs actual detailed answers…
Then there are all the various billing systems for various marketplaces, that all wanna require memberships for one time sales, before they tell you the shipping cost.
And so so much more.
It’s all heavily dysfunctional and lame and not user friendly at all anymore.
Apps get more permissions than websites do. Websites being bad is on purpose to make you use the app so they can collect and sell more data.
Its enshittification
Yeah it’s by design
No, but only because I do not use apps, so do not have a reference to compare with. If I can’t do it on your website, I don’t do it.
If I can’t do it on your website, I don’t do it.
I guess you’re not gonna ever file for unemployment…
(ID.me has joined the chat)
Oh funny thing. My dad, a citizen of China, had to renew passport and China now forces you to use their app to do the renew… lol
Comming soon to the west… ETA 2026
ID.me is super painful, but you can verify yourself without a smartphone or any apps. I’ve done it.
oh?
I think they make you do a video call for “random” “additional verification” because it got flagged or something and the web thing is broken…
Yeah, I did the video call on a desktop PC.
If I have to use ID.me for something, I just don’t do it.
The amount of sites claiming there’s suspicious traffic coming from my IP is getting ridiculous
Same here. So many websites are now virtually unusable. It doesn’t seem to happen with Chinese sites, though.
Nah, Chinese sites would try to auto-download the .apk file 10 times lmfao
I was just trying to use Baidu Street Views for childhood nostalgia… fuck off with the apps lmfao
They also require a phone number attached to a government ID to register an account 😭
Even the new version of my banking app seems bad in comparison to the old one. Sure looks nice, but having a white screen until the web app has downloaded isn’t really good design
I agree completely! So many sites have forced me to download an app to accomplish what I need!
First Covid happened and I noticed every piece of tech started getting bad updates.
Then AI happened and things got worse…
Grubhub’s website seems intentionally unusable. Slow, constant errors, randomly logs me out, etc.
Clothing sites nearly always make my phone (iPhone 13) run hot after a few minutes of browsing. Often the phone as a whole will start to get really slow (thermal throttling?) and I have to force quit the browser and maybe even restart iOS.
I have a 13 Mini and even Lemmy makes that happen sometimes but it’s gotten way worse for me since the update to iOS 26.
deleted by creator
USA
I always use real IP on Chrome for any money activity
So often I get a “card declined” bs
Like seriously, you can swipe it in the store and it works…
deleted by creator
I think they mean they don’t mask their IP (as in, use their real/true IP) for payments.
It’s mostly better than it was in the 90s when things first started trying to be more than just static text and images. But government websites are somehow even worse.
