McGrath: Red Hat’s commitment to open source

You clearly haven't set up a DD in the UK (and possibly Europe). It's incredibly easy to set up a fraudulent DD. It doesn't happen often, because (a) it's normally easily reversed, and (b) the banks are legally on the hook.

It's just a right pain if you're the victim, which is why I tend to treat my current account details as seriously private.

Cheers,
Wol

No signature is required for DDs in a number of countries, AFAIK. If a company wants to set up a DD, they just need your bank details to do so. And someone can misrepresent themselves to a company and give your bank details. I guess the company has to swallow the cost when it's discovered, but it will still cost you one or more mornings of phone calls to get it sorted out. See my sibling comment.

The bank does not physically check the signatures. The organisation setting up the direct debit asserts to the bank that they have received appropriate permission (a signature isn't the only way). In exchange, the end-user gets prior notification of the direct debit and can cancel it anytime and even undo any direct debits for the last 13 months. And the bank will charge the organisation setting up the DD a hefty charge-back fee. Do it too often and they'll kick you off altogether.

For this reason my apartment management refuses to do DD for the monthly service costs, because of shenanigans with people selling their apartment and then reversing all the fees for the previous year. Sure, you can prove that you had the right to do DD, even a signature, but you'll have to send it to debt collection or even the courts to get your money.

So yes, someone could publish their IBAN here and I could (attempt to) setup a direct debit for it, but it would be fraud. Really big organisations like energy and insurance companies use DD because people undoing direct debits without cause is just another one of the many things that can go wrong and it's just a cost of doing business.