Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

markets.businessinsider.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 587 posts

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#341

Post by babypuncher »

rbanffy wrote: post #265
mywittyname wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Five years seems pretty mild when you consider the chief purpose of sanctions is to provide an alternative to war as a means of settling disputes. And this man is willfully undermining the ability of his country to levy sanctions. Surely actively undermining the security of ones country is a serious offense.

> as a means of settling disputes As a means of forcing someone to unwillingly settle a dispute in your favor that is. I have no sympathy for North Korea, but sanctions are not an alternative to war. Sanctions are an alternative to bullets.

Sabotaging your own military's weapons still sounds an awful lot like treason

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#342

Post by chatmasta »

gnulinux wrote: post #304
chatmasta wrote: post #48

I met Virgil at an academic workshop back in 2014. We went out in Amsterdam. He was a weird guy, to say the least (he’d probably be the first to agree). He was generally quite affable and obviously highly intelligent. He’s an idiot for this fiasco. But it’s also sad to see him in jail; I don’t see how this benefits society in any way. Five years in prison seems like a disproportionate punishment for an arguably victi…

What? North Korean government is the most totalitarian, brutal, ruthless state in the world today. You can't just play "there is no victim" card when you illegally help out an enemy government like that. Even if you're ideologically or for some other reason inclined to support NK, you need to understand that being a US citizen makes your actions extremely impactful on world stage. It seems like Virgil was truly in a…

This argument would be more convincing if he provided material support to NK and didn’t simply relay publicly available information. It seems he’s been sanctioned primarily for his speech, not selling weapons or purchasing contraband. And it’s not like he was divulging state secrets.

Anyway, the conviction mostly makes sense to me. The sentencing seems disproportionate.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#343

Post by babypuncher »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #174
marcinzm wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming the goal is some sort of democratic revolution rather than keeping the economies of those countries constrained so they have less money to spend on weapons.

Interesting implications for the case of Cuba. If so, their primary crime is being a country in close proximity to the USA. So much for arguments of respecting national autonomy.

I do not think it is relevant today, but during the Cold War their crime was being all buddy-buddy with the USSR and offering to host some of their nuclear ICBMs.

The USSR is long dead though, and nobody is asking Cuba to hold on to WMDs for safe keeping, so the continued sanctions make no real sense in 2022.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#344

Post by freemint »

dahdum wrote: post #314
tomatowurst wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no lawyer but I can only dream that they might find more stuff to throw the book at him but somehow i doubt this. How you go and help a country that your own country is at war with, starves women and children, sends a prisoner's entire family to prison camps for three generations where do all sorts of horrible things and spend only 5 years in prison. People have been sent to prison far longer just because they ha…

The sanctions are intended to exacerbate the destitution and starvation in North Korea in order to provoke political upheaval. They are also just the current strategy, and have been ineffective from a humanitarian perspective. I wouldn’t undermine them personally, but I understand how a rational person could come to believe it was even a moral obligation to do so.

The sanctions are to slow the nuclear weapon program and that an ally (south korea) has to spend less on defense.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#345

Post by tofuahdude »

dahdum wrote: post #314
tomatowurst wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no lawyer but I can only dream that they might find more stuff to throw the book at him but somehow i doubt this. How you go and help a country that your own country is at war with, starves women and children, sends a prisoner's entire family to prison camps for three generations where do all sorts of horrible things and spend only 5 years in prison. People have been sent to prison far longer just because they ha…

The sanctions are intended to exacerbate the destitution and starvation in North Korea in order to provoke political upheaval. They are also just the current strategy, and have been ineffective from a humanitarian perspective. I wouldn’t undermine them personally, but I understand how a rational person could come to believe it was even a moral obligation to do so.

> intended to exacerbate the destitution and starvation

What support is there for this statement?

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#346

Post by tofuahdude »

ttybird2 wrote: post #262

Reposting it from the previous thread: He is the creator of WikiScanner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WikiScanner https://www.reuters.com/article/us-security-wikipedia-idUSN1... He also created Tor2web with Aaron Swartz and used to work for the tor team. Seems like an interesting guy. It's a shame that this happened. The situation is kinda similar to the one with Bobby Fischer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Fisc…

It's a shame that he took these actions or that he was punished for them?

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#347

Post by root_axis »

kayamon wrote: post #267
root_axis wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trading bottled energy? What? That is a totally dishonest characterization, the energy is not "bottled" it it's burned and never again recoverable.

The coin is the proof that the energy was used. You're effectively trading how much you value energy.

No, that's incorrect. The price of the bitcoin has no relationship to the amount of energy burned mining it; if this were true then Satoshi's wallet would be worthless.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#348

Post by tuwtuwtuwtuw »

ipaddr wrote: post #279
tomatowurst wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no lawyer but I can only dream that they might find more stuff to throw the book at him but somehow i doubt this. How you go and help a country that your own country is at war with, starves women and children, sends a prisoner's entire family to prison camps for three generations where do all sorts of horrible things and spend only 5 years in prison. People have been sent to prison far longer just because they ha…

The santions are resposible for starving women/children. Should he be in prison for helping children eat?

That's like saying the judge is responsible when a man is experiencing a bad time in jail, instead of the man being responsible because he commited the crime which put him there.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#349

Post by kgwgk »

ipaddr wrote: post #279
tomatowurst wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no lawyer but I can only dream that they might find more stuff to throw the book at him but somehow i doubt this. How you go and help a country that your own country is at war with, starves women and children, sends a prisoner's entire family to prison camps for three generations where do all sorts of horrible things and spend only 5 years in prison. People have been sent to prison far longer just because they ha…

The santions are resposible for starving women/children. Should he be in prison for helping children eat?

Fat Tony : Bart, is it wrong to steal a loaf of bread to feed your starving family?

Bart : No.

Fat Tony : Well, suppose you got a large starving family. Is it wrong to steal a truckload of bread to feed them?

Bart : Uh uh.

Fat Tony : And, what if your family don't like bread? They like... cigarettes?

Bart : I guess that's okay.

Fat Tony : Now, what if instead of giving them away, you sold them at a price that was practically giving them away. Would that be a crime, Bart?

Bart : Hell, no.

Re: US sentences crypto expert to 5 years after North Korea blockchain presentation

#350

Post by linspace »

Brian_K_White wrote: post #222
mayankkaizen wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May be a bit extreme comment but not completely nonsensical. It is raising somewhat valid point. Currently Russian regime is not that much different from NK regime. Both are under sanctions. In fact, Russia is more dangerous than NK in current situation. Germany needs fuel and it is essentially financing Russia. The only difference between NK and Russia is that nobody is dependent on NK for anything. This guy helped…

Germany needs those btu's. And the German authorities are invested with the authority and responsibility to make exactly that sort of decision. Did this guy need to help NK for anything remotely like that sort of responsibility?

> Did this guy need to help NK for anything remotely like that sort of responsibility?

This is what keeps me wondering. I guess that a guy with a doctorate from Caltech and in the current technological context could be making a lot of money legally.

From outside it looks like he is some kind of crypto idealist.

Post reply on HN