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Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

mtgox.com

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Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#21

Post by tlrobinson »

mjgoins wrote: post #15
tlrobinson wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still useful, just less anonymous.

From bitcoin.org: "Bitcoin is not anonymous" http://bitcoin.org/en/you-need-to-know

Yeah I should have been more specific: less pseudononymous.

Eavesdroppers (local, ISP, or NSA) can link specific addresses to your IP address when you make a transaction.

One workaround is to use a hosted online wallet or submit pre-signed transactions to the network through a third party like https://blockchain.info/pushtx (assuming the connection is secure, including resistance to traffic analysis isn't possible)

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#23

Post by 0x006A »

downandout wrote: post #16

For those willing to wait, this should temporarily make arbitrage more profitable. People that cannot wait 2 weeks for withdrawals will have to use their USD balances at Mt Gox to (re)purchase Bitcoins, which can then be moved to other exchanges and sold. This will cause a temporary, artificial increase in demand at Mt Gox only, leading to a higher-than-normal price differential between it and other exchanges. That s…

just do it

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#24

Post by skriticos2 »

sneak wrote: post #9

A reminder: bitcoin, like tor, is useless if the government has a realtime analysis of the L3 network traffic of a majority of the participants, as we have learned they do in the US under NSA's MAINWAY and MARINA programs.

The avarage Bitcoin trade is not ananymous. You have to provide identification with most exchanges and you'd have to invest a lot of effort to stay really anonymous.

The primary benefit of Bitcoin is it's speed utility (you can send money to anywhere within minutes and low fees) and the inability to freely create infinite amount of it (scarcity).

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#25

Post by tmandarano »

pvnick wrote: post #18
sneak wrote: post #9

A reminder: bitcoin, like tor, is useless if the government has a realtime analysis of the L3 network traffic of a majority of the participants, as we have learned they do in the US under NSA's MAINWAY and MARINA programs.

Is there any theoretical way to defeat these programs and ensure anonymity? I'm even suspect of SSL given private keys can probably be demanded through FISA court.

Well, not fully defeat, but you could make yourself less of a target by using a series of shell accounts and effectively laundering the money.

Just Google laundering. Techniques are widely publicized and accessible.

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#26

Post by zachrose »

pvnick wrote: post #18
sneak wrote: post #9

A reminder: bitcoin, like tor, is useless if the government has a realtime analysis of the L3 network traffic of a majority of the participants, as we have learned they do in the US under NSA's MAINWAY and MARINA programs.

Is there any theoretical way to defeat these programs and ensure anonymity? I'm even suspect of SSL given private keys can probably be demanded through FISA court.

Use separate hardware on public wifi. Take the battery out when you're done.

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#27

Post by 1053r »

downandout wrote: post #16

For those willing to wait, this should temporarily make arbitrage more profitable. People that cannot wait 2 weeks for withdrawals will have to use their USD balances at Mt Gox to (re)purchase Bitcoins, which can then be moved to other exchanges and sold. This will cause a temporary, artificial increase in demand at Mt Gox only, leading to a higher-than-normal price differential between it and other exchanges. That s…

Over the last few weeks, bitstampUSD has moved from 6% to 14% on this chart. My guess is that only accelerates that process.

http://www.bitcoincharts.com/charts/volumepie/

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#29

Post by drcode »

sneak wrote: post #9

A reminder: bitcoin, like tor, is useless if the government has a realtime analysis of the L3 network traffic of a majority of the participants, as we have learned they do in the US under NSA's MAINWAY and MARINA programs.

Not true: A new transaction in the bitcoin network isn't linked to any IP address, since transactions diffuse through the network haphazardly: There's nothing to distinguish between a transaction coming from elsewhere and a new transaction originating in the client. The only way to figure out the originating IP address would be to collect all data on close to 100% of the network and analyse the data in a sophisticated way.

Hunting down a money trail through the block chain by getting user data from exchanges or points of purchases without trying to determine the raw IP for a particular transaction is much more tractable, as others have pointed out.

EDIT: User "sneak" has changed the wording of his original comment, so this reply now doesn't make as much sense)

Re: Statement Regarding Temporary Hiatus on U.S. Dollar Withdrawals

#30

Post by drcode »

patio11 wrote: post #28

Hate to quote myself, but see the P.S. here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5568610 If I were a gambling man, I'd say this is quite likely to be shoe #1.

Unfortunately true. I'd hate to tell everyone with money in mtgox that it is time for a bank run, but...
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