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BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

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Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#151

Post by ubernostrum »

Nursie wrote: post #148
ubernostrum wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As others have noted, the US didn't just make up jurisdiction here or declare that they can prosecute anything anywhere -- the charges include an allegation that he transferred stolen BTC to a US-based company. That creates a crime the US has jurisdiction to prosecute. It really is time for people to stop being gobsmacked at the idea that once you get entangled with an entity in a particular country, anything you do…

I still find it bizarre though - they may never have left their bedroom and suddenly we have a country on another continent getting involved.

If someone in Greece had, while sitting in their bedroom in front of a laptop, hacked into a US bank and stolen money, would you be surprised if the US wanted to extradite and prosecute?

The idea that "on the internet" is a magical stateless realm has only ever been an idea in the minds of naïve geeks. It has never been reality.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#152

Post by stepik777 »

mrb wrote: post #53

BTC-E has been seen by the Bitcoin community as "shady" for years. People have always recommend others to avoid using it. It was rumored to be an easy place to sell stolen Bitcoins. It has always offered strangely convoluted pathways to transfer fiat to financial institutions (see http://bitcoinworldwide.net/how-to-deposit-money-into-btc-e ). I'm glad BTC-E finally got taken down. I am not surprised it was involved i…

If you want to exchange cryptocurrency for USD then sure, those other exchanges are better. But not everyone wants USD.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#153

Post by Jabanga »

joosters wrote: post #139
Jabanga wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Subsequently I expect to see Monero delisted from any exchange that follows KYC after some pressure from law enforcement. This would be a very dangerous precedent for the cause of privacy. It's the financial equivalent of banning encrypted communication.

Bullshit. Every other bank and (non-crypto) exchange in existence requires some form of KYC, and they will want to know the source of larger funds. And isn't this an admission that Monero is of no real legal use? Otherwise, why would you care about cashing it out at an exchange? You could spend it on goods and services instead.

This is not a bank or cryptoexchange. It's an electronic currency. Your equating of banks/cryptoexchange, which are subject to FinCen regulations on currency conversion, with electronic currency is intellectually dishonest. It's a barely concealed rhetorical sleight of hand. You know very well that the corollary here would be banning cash deposits. A private electronic currency is the electronic equivalent of cash.

>And isn't this an admission that Monero is of no real legal use?

What kind of absurd conclusion is that? There are infinite number of possible non-criminal reasons why one would want to convert one currency to another. In fact, the currency having the property of not leaking private information has no bearing on that.

>Otherwise, why would you care about cashing it out at an exchange? You could spend it on goods and services instead.

This is absolute nonsense. Why do we have USD-YEN exchanges?

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#154

Post by strgrd »

mrb wrote: post #53

BTC-E has been seen by the Bitcoin community as "shady" for years. People have always recommend others to avoid using it. It was rumored to be an easy place to sell stolen Bitcoins. It has always offered strangely convoluted pathways to transfer fiat to financial institutions (see http://bitcoinworldwide.net/how-to-deposit-money-into-btc-e ). I'm glad BTC-E finally got taken down. I am not surprised it was involved i…

> It has always offered strangely convoluted pathways to transfer fiat to financial institutions

Your link is not evidence of "strange convolution." The reason there are so many steps/screenshots is because the payment service is in Russian, and the guide is designed for non-Russian speakers.

Most people never dealt with fiat on BTC-e, and would use someone like Coinbase to fund the purchase of coins, and trade exclusively in crypto on BTC-e.

> Now the top 12 or so volume-ranked Bitcoin exchanges listed at https://cryptowat.ch are perfectly legitimate trustworthy companies.

BTC-e was number six on that list...

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#155

Post by csomar »

openmosix wrote: post #22

The question for me is: why US? He is a Russian citizen, the company is based in Bulgaria, servers in Russia, legal HQ in Cyprus and all the services operated from Seychelles - arrested in Greece. The MtGox hack affected a Japanese company. I'm not debating the nature of the crimes, etc - I am just wondering, when does it become a US case? I can get the "there were US customers" - but why not Europe? Or Japan? Or Rus…

The US has this "thinking" that the world is just their backyard. It is not really in the law, strictly speaking. But if you have been watching the news, they strongly interfere with countries for their own (or their politicians) benefit.

For example, they hit Libya with missiles right when Al-Gaddafi sent troupes to defend from future-ISIS militants.

So yes, the US will get involved in stuff that matters to it.

> The question for me is: why US?

Because if you know the US is coming and dropping bombs, who the hell wants to fight it? Even Russia is abstaining hard to prevent the nuclear war possibility though the US have been doing all it can to start it.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#156

Post by emn13 »

modeless wrote: post #114
kadavero wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is ridiculous overreach. It sets a dangerous precedent where any online trader must be mindful of all legislation of all possible jurisdictions on the world. Otherwise, sell porn, have one customer from Saudi Arabia, go for a vacation in Turkey, and here comes your flogging extradition trip. At the same time, US has a "Hague invasion act" authorizing military action against international prosecution of their off…

You missed the part where he personally transferred stolen money into the US, and hosted his service in the US.

If hosting is enough to be considered present in the US, then the US cloud providers better get ready for some unpleasantly stiff competition.

I'm not sure it's a factor here.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#157

Post by wpietri »

Dolores12 wrote: post #51

1) Arresting btc-e admin made all US customers to lose their balances on btc-e exchange. I highly doubt btc-e will come back online. 2) If you run online exchanger and have a single US customer, then you have to register your operation in USA. I find it ridiculously stupid.

> If you run online exchanger and have a single US customer, then you have to register your operation in USA. I find it ridiculously stupid.

When you don't know much about something, it can often look stupid.

This isn't new or complex, though. If you do business across a border, governments on either sides of the border may take an interest in the transaction. If you don't like that, don't do business across a border. "Online" isn't a special magic transdimensional place. It's just a web of connections between existing places.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#158

Post by wpietri »

SwellJoe wrote: post #104
dest wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may get it back in the future, if they open again… or not. Sorry for your loss It is reasonably well-known that it is dangerous to leave money on exchanges. BTC is only yours when it's in a wallet with a private key that is known to you, and no third party.

I've lost more in my own local wallets due to losing both of the USB flash drives that contained the keys (as ridiculous as it sounds, I think my girlfriend's cat stole one of them). Realistically, I've come to think cryptocurrency just isn't for me; it's too damned easy to lose. I also forgot my passphrase for some other BTC (I think I remember it, but it doesn't work, so, there those went). It's not huge sums; 1 BT…

> Realistically, I've come to think cryptocurrency just isn't for me; it's too damned easy to lose.

I think this is one of the reasons that Bitcoin has never taken off in any real-world sense. (Yes, criminals and speculators love it. But aside from that, its use is trivial.) The math is very cool, but the anthropology was incredibly weak.

People who build real consumer products spend a lot of time studying users and solving small problems for them. As you see even in this thread, early adopters always deride the dumbness, weakness, and laziness of mainstream users. But derision doesn't cause adoption. Indeed, it often blocks the humility and hard work needed to make something competitive in the real world.

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#159

Post by hellbanner »

realusername wrote: post #118
devrandomguy wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if you just ban all Americans? /duck

that's indeed what lots of banks are currently doing at the moment.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/deborahljacobs/2012/07/31/most-...

Re: BTC-e and its founder charged in 21-count indictment over hack of Mt. Gox

#160

Post by hellbanner »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #95
disillusioned wrote: post #52

An interesting comment validated here, from 7 years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1533033

That comment is very general though. Exchanging bitcoins for cash, gold, diamonds for example would be harder to trace.

Exchanging BTC for cash, gold or diamonds is much more difficult ( and there's a higher perceived danger ). How would you go about trading your BTC for diamonds?

Btc-to-diamonds.website ? If it's online, it's tracked by 5 eyes Tor? 5-eyes is even more interested Craigslist? Great, go meet a stranger in a parking lot and gamble that you don't get robbed.

The comment is general but it's right. As it & other posters in this thread have pointed out - existing power structures control the world. The internet does not exist in an imaginary "stateless" vacuum.

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