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Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

nytimes.com

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Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#61

Post by nytesky »

ericbuildsio wrote: post #40
paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

Could someone explain to me where the myth of "crypto = untrackable" comes from, and why it's still being perpetuated? Storing a record of every single transaction on a publicly accessible blockchain sounds trackable by design

I think it’s part of the Origin Story.

Bitcoin was created by Satoshi Nakamoto almost 20 years ago. There are a number of wallets that people believe belong to Satoshi (have they proven they belong to SN?)

Yet the identification of Satoshi has eluded a global hunt to identify him. Maybe law enforcement has not been involved, but the mystery definitely suggests that BitCoin can help mask identity.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#62

Post by MASNeo »

torginus wrote: post #32
paxys wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only because in this case they used a centralized exchange. The amount of actual circulation to countries like Iran and North Korea is likely many orders of magnitude higher that what is knowable.

I know some pretty sharp folks who fork for various police departments chasing illicit crypto related activity. The amount of stuff they can track including timing of transactions, entry and exit points, etc, and so over a long period of time means that most of the traditional anyonmization methods like tumblers simply do not work. Eventually someone, somewhere makes a mistake and the transactions and wallets can be…

I am working to track and trace and time transactions and while this is possible when and if you know the identity of at least one participant it’s quite another thing when no identity is known at all. Criminals know that so it’s notoriously hard to pull off. Thanks to Daleware secrecy and lax Super PAC rules to disclose sources of funds it’s not going to get easier.

So either your friends are genius saucers or they have effective government intelligence that would be highly appreciated. I’d be interested.

You are spot on regarding the bedroom though. Exporting physical USD is far more lucrative, by the shipload, often by Chinese Money Laundering Organisations, for free.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#63

Post by whynotmaybe »

rwmj wrote: post #59
chihuahua wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the #1 use case for crypto was ransomware, followed by shitcoin rug-pulls, and the ability to commit theft without recourse. Sending money to Iran is just a minor edge case.

That's a rather narrow view of crypto's uses. What about subverting democracy by bribing the President?

For me it was buying a computer from newegg but I confess I'm not playing in the same league.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#64

Post by whynotmaybe »

lambda wrote: post #54
hilliardfarmer wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a deeply troubling and cynical comment. As far as I know, nowhere in the Bitcoin white paper or the original code base. Does it say anything about what you seem to think it's use cases are. Bitcoin has one main use, digital cash, that can be sent instantly and for free or a very low fee. Edit: I would agree though, that anything other than that is probably a scam.

What? "Instantly and for a very low fee"? Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction. They've since added hacks on top of the original Bitcoin protocol to get the price back down again, but the original design was not good for low fees. And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle, that's hardly instant. If you accept a transaction instantly, it's relatively easy for someone to scam you by do…

>And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle >Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction

So it's cheaper to use Paypal ?

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#65

Post by EricDeb »

mikestew wrote: post #46
g947o wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Citation needed. Bear in mind that this guy pleaded guilty in a court case. Even if the prosecution is political, the facts don't lie.

Bear in mind that this guy pleaded guilty in a court case. In my mind that doesn't mean shit. Prosecution said, "if this goes to trial, we'll try to get life in prison. Or you could take our plea deal." That is why 90-some percent of prosecutions (EDIT: in the U. S.) go plea deal instead of trial.

I would imagine very rich people have extremely good lawyers though that can tell them very accurately if they will get off if it goes to trial.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#66

Post by michaelteter »

LunaSea wrote: post #11

Remember that the CEO of Binance was pardoned by Trump after pleading guilty to financial fraud.

Iran obviously missed the memo. All they have to do is setup a wealth fund and invest heavily in a Trump venture; then they can become a most favored nation and forego all this conflict.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#67

Post by lambda »

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #60
lambda wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? "Instantly and for a very low fee"? Fees have historically gone up above $100 per transaction. They've since added hacks on top of the original Bitcoin protocol to get the price back down again, but the original design was not good for low fees. And transactions can take 30 minutes or more to settle, that's hardly instant. If you accept a transaction instantly, it's relatively easy for someone to scam you by do…

Pointing at the BTC transaction fee and saying it is super expensive is like pointing at a problematic car model and saying all cars are bad. There are any number of other popular coins out there that have the same or better liquidity as BTC that charge tiny fractions of the fees. And also settle in seconds. You're saying Bitcoin like BTC, but the parent commenter was probably referring to the giant ecosystem of coin…

What? I was replying to someone who explicitly referenced the Bitcoin whitepaper, they were clearly talking about BTC. And the protocol from the whitepaper was actually pretty bad, from a cost and transaction time point of view. It's gotten a bit better with some hacks layered on top of it.

And yeah, the thing is, payment systems that work approximately as well as BTC exist without being cryptocurrency and using up so much electricity on mining. The main difference is that they don't operate in some areas where BTC still can (like evading sanctions, like this), and the speculative nature of BTC (which is actually a net negative on using it as a cash).

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#68

Post by _alternator_ »

ericbuildsio wrote: post #40
paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

Could someone explain to me where the myth of "crypto = untrackable" comes from, and why it's still being perpetuated? Storing a record of every single transaction on a publicly accessible blockchain sounds trackable by design

The truth is there are some currencies that are by design untrackable—monero and zcash, for example, which use privacy preserving techniques to avoid tracking. (IMO zcash is a better implementation than monero, but shrug.)

Bitcoin and ethereum and most other crypto currencies are absolutely traceable in the sense that anyone can see who you send your money to. And all of the implementations have the core challenge of getting back to fiat—at some point, you withdraw cash or otherwise pay a real person to do something for you. There’s no way around that.

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#69

Post by wnevets »

paxys wrote: post #6

Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto? Everyone wants an untrackable unblockable currency that is out of government control until the day it is used for things they don't like, then suddenly "government please control this!"

> Isn't this like the #1 use case for crypto?

What is even the point of crypto if you can't commit crimes with it?

Re: Binance fired employees who found $1.7B in crypto was sent to Iran

#70

Post by wpietri »

hilliardfarmer wrote: post #41
chihuahua wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the #1 use case for crypto was ransomware, followed by shitcoin rug-pulls, and the ability to commit theft without recourse. Sending money to Iran is just a minor edge case.

What a deeply troubling and cynical comment. As far as I know, nowhere in the Bitcoin white paper or the original code base. Does it say anything about what you seem to think it's use cases are. Bitcoin has one main use, digital cash, that can be sent instantly and for free or a very low fee. Edit: I would agree though, that anything other than that is probably a scam.

It seems entirely accurate to me, at least in a POSIWID sense.

The original theory of Bitcoin was, as described in the paper, decentralized digital cash. But in practice it was never optimized for what normal people use cash for. As system like that would be something like M-PESA.

Even at the time, cash was declining in usage. In the 18 years since, it has declined a lot more. And for good reason, because what most people want for most things isn't digital cash, but digital money. E.g., debit cards and Venmo.

So pretty naturally Bitcoin has value only for a few niche use cases that are not well served by more effective systems. Various sorts of crime, mostly. Digital cash, sure, but the kind that's transferred in unmarked envelopes slid quietly across the table. The kind that is delivered in a briefcase.

As a side note, it also failed in its goal of being decentralized. The mining power is very concentrated. Much more so than the banking industry, for example. And most users keep their Bitcoin on deposit in centralized services. So it's again basically banking but worse.

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