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Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

nytimes.com

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Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#91

Post by lambda »

whynotmaybe wrote: post #64
lambda wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? "Instantly and for a very low fee"? Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction. They've since added hacks on top of the original Bitcoin protocol to get the price back down again, but the original design was not good for low fees. And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle, that's hardly instant. If you accept a transaction instantly, it's relatively easy for someone to scam you by do…

>And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle >Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction So it's cheaper to use Paypal ?

They've since added some hacks to enable it to handle more transactions and bring the price down. Effectively, the network had hit its limit on the number of transactions it could fit in a block, so you had to pay high fees to get accepted in a block, the miners simply couldn't accept all transactions; but they've added ways of fitting more transactions into a block that have helped drive prices back down again.

So now it's back to being cheaper than Paypal, but yeah, there was a time when there were $100+ transaction fees. And it may hit that again if transaction numbers go up enough to fill up blocks with the new implementation.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#92

Post by bigstrat2003 »

paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

The #1 use case for crypto is that it's anonymous like cash. And yes, this enables people to use it for crime... just like they use cash. The unavoidable cost of freedom has always been that some people will misuse it. Personally, I would rather have freedom even if it gets misused than not have freedom even if it means crime is over.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#93

Post by knallfrosch »

liamconnell wrote: post #10
stevofolife wrote: post #5

The article title doesn't say "Fired". The HN title is kind of misleading.

I think NYT uses multiple titles for some articles. I had copy pasted it

They A/B test titles. You can see it in the URL, where the recessive title often lives on. They may also use different titles for print/digital.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#94

Post by lacoolj »

Contrary to a lot of comments here, the only way to use bitcoin (or any cryptocurrency) without tracking is to mine it yourself, and even then...

Where did you get it? Purchased/transferred? Where did they get it? What else did the person with that wallet do?

If the answer is "mined", even then, you have to actually do something with it, right? Buy something? Where is that something shipped? At worst you'll have to pay customs on it, and have it actually get through customs. At best, your address is in a database now.

Have it shipped somewhere obscure? Video cameras are everywhere. Have it shipped to someone else's house and steal it off their porch? Again, cameras everywhere.

Not have a physical item? Just a service? That's pretty much the closest you'll get to anonymous money transfer and full usage (along with whatever VPN you prefer).

Cool that was a fun mental exercise. Now everyone tell me why I'm wrong!

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#95

Post by lucketone »

MASNeo wrote: post #62
torginus wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know some pretty sharp folks who fork for various police departments chasing illicit crypto related activity. The amount of stuff they can track including timing of transactions, entry and exit points, etc, and so over a long period of time means that most of the traditional anyonmization methods like tumblers simply do not work. Eventually someone, somewhere makes a mistake and the transactions and wallets can be…

I am working to track and trace and time transactions and while this is possible when and if you know the identity of at least one participant it’s quite another thing when no identity is known at all. Criminals know that so it’s notoriously hard to pull off. Thanks to Daleware secrecy and lax Super PAC rules to disclose sources of funds it’s not going to get easier. So either your friends are genius saucers or they…

There is a third option, that those being tracked make mistakes

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#96

Post by jacobjjacob »

paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

It’s 100% trackable. It’s anonymous but there are many datapoints that could be used to deanonymize if the transaction parties are not extremely careful

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#97

Post by kevinak »

lambda wrote: post #54
hilliardfarmer wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a deeply troubling and cynical comment. As far as I know, nowhere in the Bitcoin white paper or the original code base. Does it say anything about what you seem to think it's use cases are. Bitcoin has one main use, digital cash, that can be sent instantly and for free or a very low fee. Edit: I would agree though, that anything other than that is probably a scam.

What? "Instantly and for a very low fee"? Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction. They've since added hacks on top of the original Bitcoin protocol to get the price back down again, but the original design was not good for low fees. And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle, that's hardly instant. If you accept a transaction instantly, it's relatively easy for someone to scam you by do…

Bitcoin via the Lightning Network is near cost-free and instant. And it's not a hack, it's just a network of payment channels.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#98

Post by throw0101a »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #92
paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

The #1 use case for crypto is that it's anonymous like cash. And yes, this enables people to use it for crime... just like they use cash . The unavoidable cost of freedom has always been that some people will misuse it. Personally, I would rather have freedom even if it gets misused than not have freedom even if it means crime is over.

> The #1 use case for crypto is that it's anonymous like cash. And yes, this enables people to use it for crime... just like they use cash.

Not quite like cash: collecting and transferring US$1.7B in cash—actual physical paper—is probably more logistically challenging than BTC.

I understand the argument for freedom, but depending on the scale/dosage many things that could be fine in small quantities aren't as good in large ones.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#99

Post by expedition32 »

paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

Money laundering is only good when our people are doing it.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#100

Post by arjie »

BenGosub wrote: post #90

Is Iran supposed supposed to be banned on Binance?

It's a US-sanctioned country so allied nations play along with the sanctions and Binance is located within that US sphere of influence so Iran is supposed to be currently banned, yes.
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