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Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

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Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#11

Post by Out_of_Characte »

cwkoss wrote: post #8
Hydraulix9899 wrote: post #2

There's this misconception that bitcoin is private / "safe" for criminals. In reality, the block chain is public (and all of its transactions inside... that is how distributed ledger consensus is achieved among miners) and the on-ramps and off-ramps between fiat are all logged / tracked, especially Coinbase (since they are taking the "safe route" and playing by all of the rules with governments / regulators). Your la…

Yep. The Bitcoin Blockchain is a permanent historical ledger. As time passes and info about who transacted what becomes public, the cost of identifying a transaction decreases. (Assuming Bitcoin is still around) we should assume that over time, the cost to unmask any given btc txn to asymptotically approach $0. Even if you escape the statute of limitations, there is a good chance your grandchildren will be able to se…

>the cost to unmask any given btc txn to asymptotically approach $0. Mind you, there are several ways to obfuscate transactions even in the bitcoin network. and there are also privacy focused blockchains to whitewash money

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#12

Post by [deleted] »

cwkoss wrote: post #9
the_local_host wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect there are few real-world examples where "you could just say X" actually works... but in this case the story is that a random "weed dealer" killed not a random person, but a specific person known to the "weed purchaser"? Who would believe that story?

How does prosecution prove the payment was connected to the hitman and not the weed? Seems like they'd need to seize the hitman's digital communications, at which point the jig is probably already up.

[deleted]

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#14

Post by cwkoss »

Out_of_Characte wrote: post #11
cwkoss wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. The Bitcoin Blockchain is a permanent historical ledger. As time passes and info about who transacted what becomes public, the cost of identifying a transaction decreases. (Assuming Bitcoin is still around) we should assume that over time, the cost to unmask any given btc txn to asymptotically approach $0. Even if you escape the statute of limitations, there is a good chance your grandchildren will be able to se…

>the cost to unmask any given btc txn to asymptotically approach $0. Mind you, there are several ways to obfuscate transactions even in the bitcoin network. and there are also privacy focused blockchains to whitewash money

All of the 'trustless' tumbling solutions I've seen tend to leave some evidence on the blockchain, it often only dilutes the certainty that a particular input maps to a particular output.

IMO, the only "surefire" way to launder bitcoin is traditional money laundering: send a trusted person dirty bitcoins and they send you back bitcoins from a clean legitimate source. Strong incentive for launderer to take the funds and run, so trust is unstable in this model.

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#15

Post by pjc50 »

PeterStuer wrote: post #6

"Man Used Bank of America to Pay Hitman in USD for Wife's Murder, FBI Says An FBI agent explains how a BoA account led the agency to the suspect."

Few people would be dumb enough to commit crimes with a bank account in their own name. Except this guy:

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/547280-gaetz-paid-accused...

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#17

Post by mindslight »

axiosgunnar wrote: post #4
Hydraulix9899 wrote: post #2

There's this misconception that bitcoin is private / "safe" for criminals. In reality, the block chain is public (and all of its transactions inside... that is how distributed ledger consensus is achieved among miners) and the on-ramps and off-ramps between fiat are all logged / tracked, especially Coinbase (since they are taking the "safe route" and playing by all of the rules with governments / regulators). Your la…

But what if he merely sent the Bitcoin from Coinbase to another wallet first - say a brain wallet he knows in his head - and then transfered the Bitcoins to the hitman? Wouldn't that be enough for him to be able to say "no i just bought some weed sorry, jail me for a month. i dont know why that person then went on to try to kill my wife."?

Being actually innocent isn't enough to protect you from the FBI, so no, any suspicious trail at all is too much. Once you're a person of interest, any of the many possible opsec failures is enough to build a case. And for (attempted) murder, the spouse is usually a person of interest.

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#19

Post by twostorytower »

Bitcoin is a dream come true for the FBI/CIA. There are companies building sophisticated software to track the routing of shady payments through the blockchain (wouldn't be surprised if Palantir does this). Eventually, crypto finds it way towards a tangible asset that can be tied to somebody and it's just a matter of a paper trail.

Re: Man used Coinbase to pay hitman in Bitcoin for wife's murder, FBI says

#20

Post by mullingitover »

Hydraulix9899 wrote: post #2

There's this misconception that bitcoin is private / "safe" for criminals. In reality, the block chain is public (and all of its transactions inside... that is how distributed ledger consensus is achieved among miners) and the on-ramps and off-ramps between fiat are all logged / tracked, especially Coinbase (since they are taking the "safe route" and playing by all of the rules with governments / regulators). Your la…

> There's this misconception that bitcoin is private / "safe" for criminals.

Is this why we've successfully caught every single ransomware operation transacting in crypto?

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