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Using Silk Road

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Re: Using Silk Road

#101

Post by tirant »

A1kmm wrote: post #74

I think the easiest attack on SR would not be one of the attacks mentioned in the article (although similar to their second attack, but focused on legal implications instead of fraud), but rather: a. Law enforcement creates a large number of vendor and customer accounts. Due to the pseudonymity, they can create as many as they like and they can't be linked (they may need to create them over time to avoid making the p…

And you won't accomplish anything by shutting down Silk Road. Most of drugs that get in a country don't do it by packages sent by Silk Road. LE (Law enforcement) is already low on resources, so they better use them for bigger 'operators'.

Re: Using Silk Road

#102

Post by adamnemecek »

A1kmm wrote: post #74

I think the easiest attack on SR would not be one of the attacks mentioned in the article (although similar to their second attack, but focused on legal implications instead of fraud), but rather: a. Law enforcement creates a large number of vendor and customer accounts. Due to the pseudonymity, they can create as many as they like and they can't be linked (they may need to create them over time to avoid making the p…

SR would have to be brain dead not to realize that this is an issue. As maxwellhansen, one has to purchase a token to become a seller which are quite expensive. Furthermore, there is a limited number of tokens and the only way to get a token is to buy it from someone (who will then lose said token). Therefore it is pretty hard to become a seller.

Re: Using Silk Road

#103

Post by Tichy »

alsothat wrote: post #81
stcredzero wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Example of batsheet?

A good example of LW going off the deep end is "Roko's basilisk" and Yudkowsky's response http://kruel.co/2013/01/12/rokos-basilisk-everything-you-nee... http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Roko%27s_basilisk

That sounds scary, but not crazy?

Re: Using Silk Road

#105

Post by jacques_chester »

revelation wrote: post #34
sruser wrote: post #17

(throwaway account) I've spent over $50,000 USD on SR in the past year, and I'm happy to answer any questions people have about the site or community.

It seems that SR doesn't solve the major problem for buyers: you have to name a postal address and that address will be printed on a package containing illicit goods. Any bad experiences with customs or have you been using in-country sellers exclusively? Any tricks to obscure your real address? (Since these have mostly been answered below already: do you stick to a fixed group of sellers or go by price?)

In countries where the incrimination standard is reasonable doubt, that you received a package addressed to you is not really a slam dunk proof that you ordered the contents.

Furthermore, in countries where you enjoy a right to refuse to say anything that may incriminate you, you may simply refuse to explain how or why the package was sent to you. The prosecution will need to positively prove that you ordered it, which is a much harder task if the seller doesn't cooperate.

(IANAL, TINLA).

Re: Using Silk Road

#106

Post by gordaco »

tirant wrote: post #101
A1kmm wrote: post #74

I think the easiest attack on SR would not be one of the attacks mentioned in the article (although similar to their second attack, but focused on legal implications instead of fraud), but rather: a. Law enforcement creates a large number of vendor and customer accounts. Due to the pseudonymity, they can create as many as they like and they can't be linked (they may need to create them over time to avoid making the p…

And you won't accomplish anything by shutting down Silk Road. Most of drugs that get in a country don't do it by packages sent by Silk Road. LE (Law enforcement) is already low on resources, so they better use them for bigger 'operators'.

Even more: if they happened to be able to close Silk Road, or make it impractical or unusable, another similar site would rise within weeks. If they don't understand this, they simply don't understand internet.

This is another example of how useless does the so-called "war on drugs" get.

Re: Using Silk Road

#107

Post by codesuela »

clicks wrote: post #58
rorrr wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only small because bitcoins are a pain in the ass to get, and haven't spread yet. Once they become mainstream, there's no reason SilkRoad can't be the next huge thing. Think about - there's nothing that stops them from selling pirated books, movies, clothing at a huge discount compared to, let's say, Amazon. Many things only cost a lot because the manufacturer's profit margin is huge. That's true about anything…

> Think about - there's nothing that stops them from selling pirated books, movies, clothing at a huge discount compared to, let's say, Amazon. And that is precisely when Bitcoins will receive renewed focus from officials all over and g-men will step forth to somehow try to make operations involving Bitcoins illegal.

Books I could see, but only expensive academic material. I'd guess the market for those is fairly small.

You don't need to get behind TOR to buy fake clothing (ioffer.com comes to mind, pretty sure there are tons of other sites around who would love to sell you fake clothing straight from a Chinese factory)

And why would you buy physical copies of pirated movies if you can get them for free?

Re: Using Silk Road

#108

Post by csmattryder »

cnp wrote: post #10
mrmagooey wrote: post #8

I wonder if the current little spike in the bitcoin price (from https://mtgox.com/ ) could be attributed to this article being posted on HN

The Bitcoin price has been dramatically spiking for the past two weeks. Very curious as to why.

Whatever it is, it's made a few people (myself included) rather rich.

Bought a fair few BTC at ~1/6th of the current price, just trying to figure out when to cash it in.

Re: Using Silk Road

#109

Post by sc0rb »

This makes me wonder what other 'interesting' business ideas people can come up with to operate as a hidden service?

Throwing anonymity into your business plans could turn up some interesting ideas....

Re: Using Silk Road

#110

Post by Jabbles »

A1kmm wrote: post #74

I think the easiest attack on SR would not be one of the attacks mentioned in the article (although similar to their second attack, but focused on legal implications instead of fraud), but rather: a. Law enforcement creates a large number of vendor and customer accounts. Due to the pseudonymity, they can create as many as they like and they can't be linked (they may need to create them over time to avoid making the p…

I think some pretty basic clustering algorithms would reveal this self-serving subset of participants in SR. The fake vendors and fake buyers would have to interact with the real ones (and positively, with real drugs) in order to go unnoticed.
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