Learn about cryptographic escrow! Actual "How It Works" text from my escrow utility available at
https://casascius.com/btcaddress-alpha.zipHow Three-Party Cryptographic Escrow Works
Escrow allows two people to transact in Bitcoin while leaving their funds visible to everybody and accessible to nobody until somebody releases them. It allows the payer or the payee to release funds to one another, and also lets a third person decide for them if the two can't agree. The third person never has access to take the funds, and is only needed to release the funds if the original two can't agree who gets them. Whoever gets a copy of all three "invitations" gets access to the funds....
Casascius, the 3 party cryptographic escrow sounds like a neat solution. Who offers this service?
Kato, I've implemented Casascius cryptographic escrow into an easy to use web service that doesn't need any 3rd party intervention. So two people could transact between each other and handle escrows themselves without having to trust a 3rd party. I don't save the wallet addresses, payment codes, or private keys to the database. I don't want to highjack the thread just wanted to point that out.