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$7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

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Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#201
post #184
post #148

You see. This is what bitcoin so fascinating... it is absolutely impossible to hide a transaction. So imagine the field day the irs would have with this if everyone used it. They basically would be able to send bills to owners of wallets. And anyone ever caught working with an undesirable would be able to have their funds more or less locked up. So now, we all watch as billions of stolen money moves and we know the m…

This fails to account for the fact that IRS currently (and maybe this changes in the future) has a hard time doing serious audits on any significant amount of wealthy people; and that the agency has pretty much been gutted over the years. [0] https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-irs-was-gutted [1] https://www.propublica.org/series/gutting-the-irs [2] https://www.gq.com/story/no-irs-audits-for-the-rich

all it takes is for one president in 2030s to create a new branch of gov that pays Google style salaries. would attract the best and brightest to write some powerful tools for all that, no?

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#202
post #189
post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HSBC knew what they were doing.... Because of their records.

“The confidential records and interviews with former employees reveal that compliance officers often filed SARs lacking even basic information about who owned companies banking with HSBC, the nature of their businesses, and where the money came from. Sometimes, records show, they asked branches for the information and were ignored or rebuffed.” There’s records and then there’s “records”. https://www.icij.org/investig…

And the record of not having a proper record.

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#203
post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Alts should be wrapped so that they become swap-able with Uniswap. In that sense, Atomic swaps are superior since you have zero counter-party risk. Who guessed Bitcoin tech is superior to that of Ethereum?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't wrapping require KYC? So how could this be used to convert the BTC to Monero?

Wrapping and KYC are orthogonal, although maybe most of the current implementations require KYC, no idea.

Cross chain atomic swaps are something else entirely. Typically they involve using timelocked multisig transactions that reveal a new part of a secret in each output, allowing both parties to redeem or both deposits to be refunded.

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#204
post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure there's no bank in the world that would be willing to make a transaction in the billions and not keep a record of it.

that's about 750,000 times what banks have to track. I think anything over $10k must be tracked or groups of transactions that are linked that are at/over that.

Anything over $10k must be reported. Or anything that "looks suspicious". Or anything that "looks like it is trying to subvert the $10k rule"

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They just shuffle coins around. Still possible to track. It's also obvious to everyone watching that the shuffling service was used. Exchanges have already started to refuse coins that passed through these services. They might as well be tainted. The real solution is to drop bitcoin and use better technology. Monero looks like the best option right now. Private transactions, concealed amounts, fungibility, low fees a…

> The real solution is to drop bitcoin and use better technology. Walk into WalMart with cash and buy a prepaid gift card. Voilà. And the best part: it works literally everywhere. Both the buying and the using. Unlike flavor-of-the-week crypto. Though, let's be real for a second, the ways to screw up from this point are many and varied. Accidentally use your home IP address to make the purchase? Oops. Did the naughty…

The Walmart gift card will only get you so far.

You can't: buy a fancy boat, car, or house. You can't pay for your kids school supplies (or school tuition), or treat your wife to a fancy hair do.

The money laundering laws try to stop people dealing in tens of thousands of dollars, who LIVE off of the money.

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#206
post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the limitation resets if you move the funds publicly?

Case law on Bitcoin is still new. No guarantees depending on the jurisdiction, but I would figure most common law regions would not see it that way. The obvious analogy is moving the stolen funds between your accounts and publishing info about that. The limitation period on the fraud would still be from when the fraud was initially discovered by its rightful owner.

I wonder if some jurisdiction has a law against transporting stolen goods, and someone could twist that into saying that moving the coins from one address to another qualifies, and consider that a new crime, with the clock starting today.

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#207
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun little reminder that when Bitfinex was "hacked" they took a 36% haircut, if memory serves, from all account holders, in all assets -- not just Bitcoin. [1] Except for one account. Coinbase . [2] They then issued tokens to all the accounts they skimmed, valued at $1 each redeemable for shares in Bitfinex. They effectively converted a $72 million dollar theft (at the time) into a $72 million dollar valuation for Bi…

The loss became tradable on their exchange, the swap for equity was optional, their was also a token for for representing the return of the stolen funds that was trading as well. Eventually the tokens representing the losses were trading for an equal value to the loss so if you were a little patient you were reimbursed. Alternatively if you took the gamble to buy the debt tokens at below dollar parity you made a nice…

The exchange of the 36% of assets for the token is a kind of fraud called conversion. [1] That it happened to work out is honestly completely irrelevant. Just as Madoff wouldn't have gotten off scott free if he'd happened to find a way to make people whole.

[1] http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/elements-conversion

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fun little reminder that when Bitfinex was "hacked" they took a 36% haircut, if memory serves, from all account holders, in all assets -- not just Bitcoin. [1] Except for one account. Coinbase . [2] They then issued tokens to all the accounts they skimmed, valued at $1 each redeemable for shares in Bitfinex. They effectively converted a $72 million dollar theft (at the time) into a $72 million dollar valuation for Bi…

Seems to me the root problem is when people decide to use Bitcoin outside of it's original intended use, and centralize it.

Well, that's because it's completely inadequate for it's intended use (due to its 2-3 tx/sec cap) forcing people into L2.

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#209
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting angle to cash out... just start sending to 1,000s of addresses - who's to say which addresses are owned by the criminals, and which are owned by other people? They'd get less than cashing it all out themselves obviously, but it would take forever to unravel what actually happened (if possible ever)

How about universal basic income? Send some to everyone monthly. Would be curious the social implications of elicit money used as a welfare utility.

I know of plenty of people who consider taxes "elicit money", and we spend that money EVERYWHERE

Re: $7.5B In Stolen Bitcoin from 2016 Bitfinex Hack has just been moved

#210
post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This fails to account for the fact that IRS currently (and maybe this changes in the future) has a hard time doing serious audits on any significant amount of wealthy people; and that the agency has pretty much been gutted over the years. [0] https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-irs-was-gutted [1] https://www.propublica.org/series/gutting-the-irs [2] https://www.gq.com/story/no-irs-audits-for-the-rich

all it takes is for one president in 2030s to create a new branch of gov that pays Google style salaries. would attract the best and brightest to write some powerful tools for all that, no?

you and I both know that could never happen, it would get contracted out to Oracle or something
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