The first test dates back to October 10th. They had been circulating on social media for a few days screenshot of PayPal transfers with the reason “Francesca Albanese”. No form of protest, almost more than curiosity. Stefano Rapone, one of the hosts of the Dyeing podcastin those days he had told an interesting episode. A friend of his, Valerio Lundinihad made a transaction on PayPal putting “Francesca Albanese” in the reference. They had been to an evening where the UN special rapporteur for Palestine was invited as a guest. The system had blocked the payment.
A consequence of the sanctions against Francesca Albanese? We did one try from different profilesrepeating the experiment with lowercase digits. We specify: Francesca Albanese was the name contained only in the reason for paymentthe money was not for her. In fact all transactions were blocked. Some passed after a few hours but none passed on the first try. But the story went on.
The checks required by PayPal
In the days following the test, PayPal contacted those who had tried to make the transfer with causal Francesca Albanese. We read: “Our support has reviewed your account and has identified some activity we would like to ask you some questions about.” The questions obviously concern transactions with the reason for “Francesca Albanese”.
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In fact then we find we are asked “An explanation of the reference to Francesca Albanese” and then again what were “the purposes of the payment”. Not only that. Secondly, in some cases we were also asked for Francesca Albanese’s date of birth. Probably for verify cases of homonymy.
The sanctions against Francesca Albanese
All accounts were restored: it was enough to explain that it was a test. We do not know for sure what the origin of these controls is. Specifically, Francesca Albanese was hit by a series of sanctions in the United States in July 2025.
Specifically, as explained in an interview with L’Altraeconomia by Alessandro Messinaformer director of Banca Etica, Albanese was included byOffice of Foreign Assets Control in the list Specially Designated Nationals. A choice that came after a series of reports signed by Albanese on US companies that collaborate with Israel.
In practice, Messina explains: “In the United States, anyone who ends up there cannot open accounts or financial relationships: banks and intermediaries are obliged to refuse and block any funds already present.” Inclusion in these lists extends, even if not formally, to banks that do not operate in the United States: “Even non-US institutions, with relationships in dollars or with US banks, “normally” apply the same prohibitions to avoid secondary sanctions or reputational damage”.
