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Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

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Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#131

Post by lend000 »

kristjansson wrote: post #129
lend000 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can you show me one of these blockchain-based mesh networks in production? How many users do they have? Why does it need to be in production? The technology is 10 years old, and it has been widely known by researchers for less than half that time. Just trying to find any hole you can pick? This is by a respected researcher who has recently shifted his focus to blockchain with the potential it has for IoT and mesh n…

The hard problem with voting systems isn’t counting the votes, but insuring that each eligible person casts at most one vote. Blockchain based voting systems might help prevent the rare case of multiple voting, but AFACT, do nothing to protect an unscrupulous government from stuffing the ballot box with fabricated votes. Ultimately, like the other issues GP raised, the technology seems to do little to solve the under…

I am not sure how the popular implementations address this, but generally speaking you can add arbitrary additional plaintext to each transaction in the block, and contribute that extra data to the signature with the private key. For example, full name or social security number (not applicable in the US since socials are private info, but feasible in asymmetric key ID systems such as Estonia's. Which brings up another potential application of blockchain: identity verification and management).

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#132

Post by [deleted] »

mihaifm wrote: post #88
johnpowell wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When Bitcoin hit around 14K my mom had heard all about the rise on MSNBC/CNN. So she asked me how to buy bitcoin. She needed to replace her radiator. She had about 500 and needed 1200 so she thought it was a reasonable gamble. So I had her send the money to me and I told her I would invest for her. I did not.. But I did inform her that when it crashed I just stuck her money in my savings account. And nothing was lost…

Not sure what your point is here. Predicting price movements is not an easy task, even for experienced traders. If you bought at 14k and sold at 20k, you would've made money. Nobody really knows the direction the market is going, otherwise we would all be rich now. Some trades make better profits than others based on experience, but for the most of us it's just pure luck.

[deleted]

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#133

Post by lostmsu »

tdb7893 wrote: post #94
mythrwy wrote: post #44

The anti blockchain sentiment on HN is something like the anti-Trump hysteria in the period leading up to/immediately after the election. Tons of grandiose "it's SO horrible" posts, tons of downvotes. I predict it will shake out about the same way also. Blockchain and bitcoin aren't going anywhere in the near future. Some people have, and will continue to have, a use (for whatever reason). The "I hates it precious!"…

I think the negative sentiment is largely because of how much the bitcoin evangelists promise. There's a lot of hype and lofty goals tossed around but cryptocurrencies have been around for nearly a decade (If I remember bitcoin started early 2009) and they mostly seem to be used for fraud and speculation now. I'm not saying that the technology is fundamentally useless but the mismatch between delivery and retoric has…

You mean mostly media talks about fraudulent use cases. Or otherwise, how do you know mostly they are used for fraud?

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#134

Post by abalone »

ryanlol wrote: post #122
abalone wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you think people who get defrauded on the Internet are "dumb". I can see why you like cryptocurrency.

I’ve been scammed on the internet, but %-wise it’s comparable to credit card fees.

Because you "vet" sellers. Somehow. Infinitely easily. For the rest of us mere mortals, the consumer protections offered by cards are an essential foundation of Internet commerce.

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#135

Post by ryanlol »

abalone wrote: post #134
ryanlol wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been scammed on the internet, but %-wise it’s comparable to credit card fees.

Because you "vet" sellers. Somehow. Infinitely easily. For the rest of us mere mortals, the consumer protections offered by cards are an essential foundation of Internet commerce.

Again, is there a point you’re trying to make here?

Can you read? Good! Then you can read reviews.

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#136

Post by ryanlol »

hueving wrote: post #114
ryanlol wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We receive up to six figures in cryptocurrency payments every week for multiple perfectly legal products. If that’s not a “legal use case”, I don’t know what is. Are we going to argue next that credit cards have no use case because other forms of payment exist? Another example: I just bought a watch off of a guy on a forum using bitcoin, bank transfers or WU would have been a far bigger pain in the ass.

What is bitcoin giving your customer that a credit card would not?

Trust.

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#137

Post by aiCeivi9 »

Ygg2 wrote: post #50
econochoice wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Despite all of this, I don't think we've hit peak blockchain fetishism yet. There's still a lot of room to make solved problems worse with a blockchain.

Webscale IOT Blockchain!!!

So IOTA? Blockchain world has already integrated all possible buzzwords.

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#138

Post by tdb7893 »

lostmsu wrote: post #133
tdb7893 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the negative sentiment is largely because of how much the bitcoin evangelists promise. There's a lot of hype and lofty goals tossed around but cryptocurrencies have been around for nearly a decade (If I remember bitcoin started early 2009) and they mostly seem to be used for fraud and speculation now. I'm not saying that the technology is fundamentally useless but the mismatch between delivery and retoric has…

You mean mostly media talks about fraudulent use cases. Or otherwise, how do you know mostly they are used for fraud?

The reason I think it's mostly speculation and fraud is that the only people I know who have crypto currency in real life have it as a speculative investment and that combined with the fact that it doesn't work well as a payment processor (historically it's been slow and expensive and even mainstream companies that used to take it seem to have often discontinued support). I actually don't think they are mostly fraud, I think they are mostly speculation and fraud is just the outcome ofof a speculative market with little regulation. I would be happy to hear about more use cases but most I've heard about have either been small toy use cases or "in the works".

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#139

Post by spiralx »

nikanj wrote: post #111
tdb7893 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the negative sentiment is largely because of how much the bitcoin evangelists promise. There's a lot of hype and lofty goals tossed around but cryptocurrencies have been around for nearly a decade (If I remember bitcoin started early 2009) and they mostly seem to be used for fraud and speculation now. I'm not saying that the technology is fundamentally useless but the mismatch between delivery and retoric has…

Fraud, speculation, and drug trade. Don't forget about the drugs.

There's ransomware as well.

Re: Hundreds of Bitcoin Wannabes Show Hallmarks of Fraud

#140

Post by lawn »

hudon wrote: post #90
lawn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may not like it but dismissing an actual use case is just ignorant after the parent comment specifically asked for one. > but there are significantly better ways of achieving the same thing. There are no ways of accepting payments digitally without a third party. There is no "better way". > transactions on Visa, Apple Pay, or PayPal all get complete within seconds. 0-conf can be accepted within seconds. Also cred…

> There are no ways of accepting payments digitally without a third party. 1- I agree. Bitcoin is no exception here: I must buy Bitcoin through GDAX. Then my transaction must be confirmed by Bitmain. And they're all running software by Blockstream. That's 3 third parties that were trusted for my purchase. 2- 0-conf transactions are very risky for recipients, hence why exchanges require confirmations. 3- Credit card c…

> I must buy Bitcoin through GDAX.

Or many other outlets including decentralized exchanges or localbitcoins.

> Then my transaction must be confirmed by Bitmain.

Or by the other miners.

> And they're all running software by Blockstream.

Or you could use Bitcoin Cash which have several development teams or use another cryptocurrency if Blockstream is your worry.

Also Bitcoin Core was mostly written before Blockstream came to be. It's also open source and you can bet that faults will be abused if they exist.

> That's 3 third parties that were trusted for my purchase.

No 3rd party is trusted when you send coins to someone else. That's the point.

> 0-conf transactions are very risky for recipients, hence why exchanges require confirmations.

They are actually quite safe if done on sane networks like Bitcoin Cash, not Bitcoin.

That's why several merchants accept 0-conf for small to medium purchases. See xmr.to as an example.

> Can you please provide an equivalent article showing how businesses are suffering due to chargebacks?

Just google "credit card chargeback fraud" or "friendly fraud" for tons of examples.

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