US withholding tax for foreigners

Funky Google electronic signatures really "out there"?

[Bottler]

It has been discussed before here before about Google Adsense requiring tax forms for certain types of customers

[webmasterworld.com ]
and that in the event that the overseas business has no US activities, a W8-BEN form will not be required.

I wonder whether Google are doing something particularly "out there" here. CJ.com for example have required all overseas publishers submit a W-8BEN form regardless of the location of their activities.

So this leads to me thinking ..... is CJ.com just making their overseas payments easier to substantiate in case of an audit even though W8s are not necessary? Or is Google going out on a limb with their nifty new electronic signature collection? Anyone here live in a country without a double tax treaty with the US who has had some battles in this area?

[europeforvisitors]

I suspect it's just a matter of different lawyers having different comfort levels about what paperwork is or isn't required.