Is Paypal Safe?

yes it is safe

paypalsucks.com will explain to you what happens when you have any sort of dispute with them. You have no rights, no recourse, and they can keep all your money. It's in the contract. People who believe that Paypal is fine and dandy haven't had a problem - yet.

As far as site encryption, account security, debit/credit card security, etc., yes they are just as safe as any other provider.

HOWEVER, if you are talking about safety FROM the company, then no, they have a horrible track record. They look like a bank, talk like a bank, act like a bank, but refuse to be (and are not) regulated like a bank. What this means, in addition to many other bad things, they can basically do whatever they want with your money. There are horror stories of people losing thousands or tens of thousands of dollars because PayPal yanked it out of their account with no due process (outside of their joke of a "protection policy" and no oversight.

If you are only using PayPal as a buyer, you should be OK, since that's who they care about. But if you are a seller, you better be very careful. PayPal does NOT have your back, and they will side with the buyer 90% of the time. And in the other 10%, if they buyer does a CC chargeback, PayPal will still yank the funds out of your account.

NEVER KEEP ANY AMOUNT OF MONEY IN YOUR PAYPAL ACCOUNT. You have little to no protection for it. If it's in your bank, while they might try to snatch it back, you at least have some safeguards in place. But if they deem your account or activity "suspicious", which is not clearly defined and you have no insight into it, they can freeze your account and make you jump through hoops for weeks or months to get your own money released.

The eBay/PayPal monopoly is only getting bigger. Be very, very wary of them, because even if they haven't screwed YOU over yet, doesn't mean they won't.