Short answers, pulled from the story.
Venmo was founded by Andrew Kortina and Iqram Magdon-Ismail, who met as freshman roommates at the University of Pennsylvania. The idea grew out of helping start a friend's yogurt shop, a jazz show MP3 idea, and the inconvenience of settling a debt after Magdon-Ismail forgot his wallet on a visit to Kortina.
Venmo was founded in 2009 and has been owned by PayPal since 2013. Braintree acquired Venmo in 2012 for $26.2 million, and PayPal then acquired Braintree in December 2013 for $800 million.
In 2021, Venmo handled US$230 billion in transactions and generated US$850 million in revenue.
The FTC settled with Venmo in February 2018 after finding false claims about its "bank-grade" security and failures to comply with the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Safeguards Rule and Privacy Rule. The FTC also said Venmo misled consumers about their ability to control transaction privacy and misrepresented fund availability; the settlement requires third-party audits every two years for ten years.
Paying with a bank account or debit card on Venmo is free, but credit card payments carry a 3% fee. Instant transfers to a debit card cost 1% or $10, whichever is less, while the standard multi-day bank transfer is free.
Venmo publishes peer-to-peer transactions publicly by default, which researchers have shown reveals sensitive details about users' lives. A 2022 University of Southern California study of 389 million public transaction notes found that 2 in 5 Venmo users publicly reveal sensitive information, and a 2021 BuzzFeed News investigation located President Joe Biden's Venmo account in under 10 minutes.