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Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

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Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#11

Post by ravingraven »

yAnonymous wrote: post #9
skrause wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because if you make it too easy for the police they'll just ask for too much all the time, even for things where they wouldn't get a warrant. This is happening in Germany all the time when a provider wants to be nice to the police. If they say "we'll get a warrant anyway", just response "okay, so get the warrant and come back and I'll give you the data". Then at least it's up to a judge to decide where giving out dat…

See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions. A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

>If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

That's a very very slippery slope. It is the job of the police to not look into data not related with the case, not yours.

Surrendering the info would be giving the police more power if anything since, they now can come and get data from anyone without a warrant (how do you even know that this account is dealing drugs other that "the police came looking for him"?).

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#12

Post by saimiam »

I want to understand this a bit better from an operational perspective..

Say my DigitalOcean VPS hosted in Germany provides a service X which can be subverted for illegal purposes. Will the police have to me to ask for data or can they go to DO and demand access to the data without my knowledge?

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#13

Post by sdoering »

yAnonymous wrote: post #9
skrause wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because if you make it too easy for the police they'll just ask for too much all the time, even for things where they wouldn't get a warrant. This is happening in Germany all the time when a provider wants to be nice to the police. If they say "we'll get a warrant anyway", just response "okay, so get the warrant and come back and I'll give you the data". Then at least it's up to a judge to decide where giving out dat…

See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions. A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

> because the servers are physically seized.

Not necessarily. A acquaintance of mine at an ISP always did that when police came knocking for "illegale pirating" allegations. His standard response was: Get a warrant or else I would commit a criminal offence (what he would have done).

Nearly never police came back with a warrant. And in the spare cases they did come back he did provide the data (if it was still available) and never did any equipment get seized.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#14

Post by ilovefood »

saimiam wrote: post #12

I want to understand this a bit better from an operational perspective.. Say my DigitalOcean VPS hosted in Germany provides a service X which can be subverted for illegal purposes. Will the police have to me to ask for data or can they go to DO and demand access to the data without my knowledge?

They can go and ask/seize since it's on German territory. Encrypt the shit out of it. My servers are in Amsterdam/Paris.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#15

Post by cr1895 »

Joe-Z wrote: post #10
yAnonymous wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions. A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

>A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized Why would the police be interested in destroying a legitimate business just because they want data for 8 users? They can just as well get the warrant and then get the data the same way they did now.

>Why would the police be interested in destroying a legitimate business

Lavabit comes to mind. I'm sure there are other examples too.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#16

Post by jarman »

yAnonymous wrote: post #2

I get user data protection and all that, but when you know that the charges are drug-related and they'd get a warrant anyway, why not cooperate and make it easier for everyone? Would you risk having your servers seized for someone you know committed a crime? If you do, you make it very easy for competitors to shut you down. edit: I'm assuming they don't blindly trust the police, but can verify the transactions to the…

>but can verify the transactions to the drug site themselves

Once you start selectively give out user data, you are basically giving out warrants yourself and acting as a judge.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#17

Post by yAnonymous »

ravingraven wrote: post #11
yAnonymous wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions. A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

>If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you. That's a very very slippery slope. It is the job of the police to not look into data not related with the case, not yours. Surrendering the info would be giving the police more power if anything since, they now can come and get data from anyone without a warrant (how do you even know that this account is d…

>how do you even know that this account is dealing drugs other that

Take a look at the transaction history. If there are transactions with known drug site wallets, give them the data they are asking for. Otherwise, request they get a warrant.

If you are going to cooperate, I think that's the most reasonable way to go about it.

Bitcoin exchanges are seen as dodgy anyway and they don't have a lobby to fight for them, so showing some way of cooperation while keeping everyone's (legal) interests in mind might be a good idea.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#18

Post by teamhappy »

saimiam wrote: post #12

I want to understand this a bit better from an operational perspective.. Say my DigitalOcean VPS hosted in Germany provides a service X which can be subverted for illegal purposes. Will the police have to me to ask for data or can they go to DO and demand access to the data without my knowledge?

Im not a lawyer, but I assume the laws behind this look pretty much the same in every western country.

I assume that if you want to search/seize somebodies property then you have get a warrant made out the the legal owner of the property. (Obviously you don't have to get a warrant if the owner voluntarily hands out the data...) In your example DO is the legal owner of the server your VPS runs on. I can't see why DO would be required to tell you about it.

I don't know how the owners of data centers play into this. I guess if you have somebody else's property in your possession and the cops have a warrant then you have to hand it to them.

Keep in mind that the actual data on the VPS may be protected by all sorts of privacy laws if, e.g., you run a mail server on it.

Edit: I forgot to mention that the location of the server and the jurisdiction the legal owner is under also play a large role. Also don't forget which jurisdiction you're under. Nobody cares that you've rented a server from a russian company located on the dark side of the moon. In this case they'll probably make the warrant out to you rather than the legal owner. And you'll have to comply.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#19

Post by yorwba »

jarman wrote: post #16
yAnonymous wrote: post #2

I get user data protection and all that, but when you know that the charges are drug-related and they'd get a warrant anyway, why not cooperate and make it easier for everyone? Would you risk having your servers seized for someone you know committed a crime? If you do, you make it very easy for competitors to shut you down. edit: I'm assuming they don't blindly trust the police, but can verify the transactions to the…

>but can verify the transactions to the drug site themselves Once you start selectively give out user data, you are basically giving out warrants yourself and acting as a judge.

And if you are allowed to do that and want to do it, why not? The purpose of a warrant is to verify that a judge has done due diligence and found the search to be justified, but if you check for yourself and come to the same conclusion, the warrant isn't really necessary.

Re: Germany's biggest Bitcoin exchange surrenders user data to the police

#20

Post by yAnonymous »

Joe-Z wrote: post #10
yAnonymous wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions. A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.

>A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized Why would the police be interested in destroying a legitimate business just because they want data for 8 users? They can just as well get the warrant and then get the data the same way they did now.

If the investigators think that you are withholding data or harboring criminals, they can take the equipment. Bitcoins generally don't have the best reputation and they're a small company, so it's more likely they'll get treated roughly be the law if they don't cooperate.

Probably not because of one user, but when the cases pile up there's a good chance it'll raise questions about the legitimacy of their service.

When you earn your money by running said service, you are likely going to want to avoid that.

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