TN Man Indicted For Romney Blackmail Attempt: Wanted $1M In Bitcoins 92
OakDragon writes "A Franklin, Tennessee man has been indicted for his attempt to blackmail Mitt Romney. Michael Mancil Brown allegedly claimed his intent to release some of Romney's pre-2010 tax documents unless one million dollars was converted to Bitcoins and deposited into an account which he specified. Demand letters were sent to Republican and Democratic Party offices in Tennessee, and Pricewaterhouse Coopers (whom he claimed to have stolen the documents from). Pricewaterhouse Coopers denies that he ever obtained such documents. Brown was also attempting to "sell" the documents to others (presumably the Democrats or other interested parties) for the same amount. And yes, he was apparently well aware of the Dr. Evil reference."
Is that really blackmail? (Score:5, Funny)
It's not like he was asking for anything of value in return.
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A better question would have been "why waste a perfectly good blackmail on something as worthless as bitcoins?".
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why waste a perfectly good blackmail on something as worthless as bitcoins?
Lack of tracability (... or so he thought...)
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Its not. It is an opening for an argument about Mitt Romney and his policies which will never be implemented at the top federal level. Page views = ratings...
Republican vs Democrats is always a good place for someone to fight. Do not give into 'we vs they'. There is only us.
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As opposed to cash in nonconsecutive $20 bills, which are trivial to trace, and which record all transactions directly at the nearest IRS office? OP and grandparent ACs have it right. This is tangentially about anything in which nerds would be interested, as nerds.
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It is not untraceable. In fact, if that bribe was paid, Romney could trace it from account to account, no matter how many the blackmailer tried to filter it through. As soon as one of the coins were used in the legal economy (for buying dollars, hosting space or whatever), he would leave traces which would link back to the original account.
Lots of bitcoin have been stolen through bitcoin's history, mostly though scams. And the vast majority of stolen bitcoin has not moved since - for good reasons. It is pos
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Re:How Is This News For Nerds?? (Score:4, Insightful)
"If he just asked for dollars instead of bitcoins, would you still have posted this??!! I don't get it, what makes this story relevant to tech or geeky news??"
A man from Tennessee knows what bitcoins are and he assumes that Romney does too, isn't that wild enough for you??
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Yes, Im quite sure Romney is oblivious to economic trends and topics, and that everyone in Tennessee has no technical prowess whatsoever.
How exactly did you get modded insightful for an idiotic jab at an entire state's residents?
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crime over the internet isn't techy?
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Today people learn, work, shop, bank, communicate, mate and basically live on the internet. Just because something happens on it doesn't make it relevant to technology.
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Does it matter? That's not even slashdot's slogan anymore.
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Well, it is, but it gets overwritten too fast for anyone to see unless they read the HTML source.
should have change the title (Score:1)
"Man charged for accepting bitcoins"
because all he does is trying to open-source romney tax return
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It's called the "Democratic Party". Their political opponents have taking to calling them the "Democrat Party" in recent years because "Democratic" sounds the same as "democratic".
Re:"Democrat Party" (Score:5, Informative)
Their political opponents have taking to calling them the "Democrat Party" in recent years because "Democratic" sounds the same as "democratic".
You say that like it's a bad thing. Personally, I think your bias is showing, because you are telling us that you like the confusion that may be caused by mixing "Democratic" and "democratic".
"One is my name, the other is not." [youtube.com]
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It's called the "Democratic Party".
By Democrats. By everyone else, it's not (and the use of the term dates to at least the late 19th century). That little rhetorical change helps remind us that the Democrat Party is not a party of democracy, but just happens to have that name.
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Re:"Democrat Party" (Score:5, Informative)
"Democrat Party" is generally accepted to be derogatory, by the people who use it and the Democrats themselves. http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/08/07/060807ta_talk_hertzberg [newyorker.com] I remember that Joe McCarthy used it.
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Corrected now; that was a slip-up, should have caught it in the original submission.
timothy
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Re:"Democrat Party" (Score:5, Insightful)
"Democrat Party" sounds like you're deliberately using bad grammar to demonize democrats, because they rate so low in your estimation.
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I think it sounds stupid but I really dont understand why people are getting bent out of shape about it. Its a name, and not a particularly insulting one (unless youre choosing to be insulted for some reason), and the intent seems pretty clear-- to avoid creating an inaccurate association between democracy and the "dem" party. (there is, of course, nothing more democratic about the "democratic" party than there is about the republican party).
If it makes anyone feel better you can call my party the "republi
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"Democrat Party" sounds like you're deliberately using bad grammar to demonize democrats
You mean Demoncrats. I'm here all week. Try the veal!
re: the write-up (Score:1, Informative)
Despite the efforts of Republican pollsters to make the whole country speak in a way that focus groups showed was mildly favorable to their interests, there is no such entity as the "Democrat Party."
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You're right.
Corrected now; that was a slip-up, should have caught it in the original submission.
timothy
Obviously... (Score:2)
He should have gone to the Pawn Stars shop (Score:5, Funny)
Look, these tax returns are unique, kinda neat. But if I buy them, they are gonna sit on a shelf for 6 months. I have to find just the right buyer. And even then, I am not sure I can get $1 million for them. I'll give you 50 bucks.
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Or if he talks to Chum, he can give the guy 5 million dollars.
Chum: "What's a buttcoin?"
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DO1Q7F23DxM [youtube.com]
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Or does Rick have an "buddy" that is an accountant that can verify the authenticity of a 1040A?
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he never even had the papers in the first place, clearly a well thought out plan
Romney?? (Score:1)
Who the hell is he?
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A liar, a tax evader, a politician who changes his views every time it's convenient, a cheat, a guy with a HUGE sense of entitlement. Someone who enjoys screwing everyone else over, and then blames it on them.
Someone who appeals to Republicans.
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Obama is not remotely as bad as Romney, not within orders of magnitude.
Nonsense. For example, none of Obama's employers have ever benefited from Obama like Bain Capital did from Romney.
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Are you saying Vulture Capitalism is a good thing?
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If Obama's massive spending and borrowing scared the shit out of investors, dragging out the recovery, then Obama was literally about 50,000 times worse than Romney, assuming you wanted to assign all Bain blame to Romney.
For this not to be true, you have to hope and pray investors are not signicantly scared and skittish when politicians spend out of control and scream the only way out is increasing taxes on them.
NO. I'm sure I'm wrong. Go on about your business.
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or you just immediately convert it back to dollars, foo
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Not enough liquid Bitcoins to complete transaction (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Not enough liquid Bitcoins to complete transact (Score:4, Informative)
Kind of pointless too, since from what I read Bitcoin transaction hashes are designed to identify exactly where the money came from, so it would be very difficult for him to convert the money into a fiat currency without it being extremely traceable.
There are laundries where this is possible (For a fee). Not every exit to BTC is guarded by the US or its extraditing allies.
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well yeah if you would expect every bitcoin user to care about it - which you can't.
and since you can't, you can laundry it.
If only they took his advice (Score:2)
$1M worth of BTC bought back on Sept 2, 2012 would be valued over $10M today and closer to $25M during the peak a few months ago. What blackmail!
He thought of everything (Score:2)
He would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for that meddling printer. Such a perfect plan.
Regulation of Bitcoin (Score:3)
Another example of why both law enforcement and regulators will have increasing interest in Bitcoin as it becomes more heavily used.
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Crazy notion. Why bother with junk bitcoins, when you can open an anonymous account in some off shore tax haven and have them transfer their money from their off shore tax haven account ie they can't report you without shooting themselves in their tax returns. Same with kidnapping the right wing rich and greedy with tax cheating off shore tax haven bank accounts, accounts hidden, transfers can never be reported and again can't say anything without shooting themselves in their tax returns. Criminals are ver
The real question (Score:2)
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He refused to release it. Therefore he must have had something to hide. The political costs of not releasing were obvious. Therefore he decided releasing it would be even worse.
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Anonymity (Score:2)
Bitcoin provides anonymity. Unfortunately like most computer security mechanisms, the weak link is the human being using them.
Even if this guy had the alleged information, and wasn't stupid enough to get caught, it makes no sense for Romney to pay him. If Romney paid the guy $1M in bitcoins, there is nothing stopping him from also selling the info to the democrats or a newspaper immediately afterwards for another $1M. It's not like you can sue the guy for breach of contract.
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Bitcoin provides anonymity. Unfortunately like most computer security mechanisms, the weak link is the human being using them.
Even if this guy had the alleged information, and wasn't stupid enough to get caught, it makes no sense for Romney to pay him. If Romney paid the guy $1M in bitcoins, there is nothing stopping him from also selling the info to the democrats or a newspaper immediately afterwards for another $1M. It's not like you can sue the guy for breach of contract.
Omg, you discovered the problem with blackmailing people. Too bad no one else ever thought of that!
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It's not necessarily made by coercion. If someone says, "Give me $1M or I will murder your children", then it is coercion. If someone says "Give me $1M or I will leak negative information about you", that is not coercion, especially if it is information that if leaked without the blackmail, would be legal. This kind of blackmail actually gives the person a choice (albeit not a very good one), where the alternative is no choice. The blackmailer is not forcing (i.e. coercing) the victim to give into the d
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That is a very broad definition of coercion. I am not saying it is a definition nobody uses, but it is one in which nearly everything can be considered coercion. It could include you're employer saying "Come to work on time or I will fire you". Whether the threat is justified does not affect it's coerciveness.
Even in the case of "Sleep with me or you're fired", being fired is not considered a life destroying phenomenon. It can be life destroying, but usually it takes more than firing someone to complete
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