US Government To Study Bitcoin As Possible Terrorist Threat 210
randomErr (172078) writes "The US Department of Defense is investigating whether Bitcoin and other virtual currencies are a potential terrorist threat. The Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office (CTTSO), a division within DOD that identifies and develops counter terrorism abilities and investigates irregular warfare and evolving threats, has listed Bitcoin among its topics for research and mission critical analysis related to terrorism."
Is there anything that's not a terrorist threat? (Score:3, Insightful)
n/t
Re:Is there anything that's not a terrorist threat (Score:5, Funny)
Eat Your Bacon (Score:2)
Our plan is finally coming to fruition!
http://www.standingonguard.com... [standingonguard.com]
Errr, only look at the URL if you are in Canada. To everyone else, we're sorry eh. Just your nice friendly neighbors eh.
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Why do you hate Muslims? (Score:2)
Are you some sort of Christianist racist?
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Given that pork-eating flight school students turned out to be Islamist terrorists, I'd have to say the answer is no.
Our success at preventing domestic terror attacks is usually credited partly to our ability to stop the terrorists from sending each-other money. BTC is specifically designed so that government's can't trace it, or interdict the cash-flow. This means the anti-terror cops damn well better have a plan for if AQ starts a major BTC mining operation.
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"Usually credited" by whom? People who have a vested interest in stopping people from sending each other money without going through them?
For that matter, how many "domestic terror attacks" have been stopped lately? Or is it simply that most people aren't crazy enough to want to blow up their own home?
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One doesn't mine bitcoins to launder cash. One buys the bitcoins, sends them around, then cashes back out.
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There are not 6-7 billion domestic terrorist in any country on Earth. I'll leave it as an excersize to the reader why that might be.
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Given that pork-eating flight school students turned out to be Islamist terrorists, I'd have to say the answer is no.
I hate to spoil your snark, but Islam, like Judaism, has a prohibition against eating pork. So you could argue that *not* eating bacon is a possible warning sign of terrorist potential...
Our success at preventing domestic terror attacks is usually credited partly to our ability to stop the terrorists from sending each-other money.
Uhm, what success? AFAIK, the only "terrorist plot" in the US that the government has prevented was that one where the idiots thought that if they blew up a fuel pipe at JFK, they could get an explosion all along that pipeline. Obviously, they didn't comprehend that for an explosion to happen, you need fuel *and* oxygen.
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I hate to spoil your snark, but Islam, like Judaism, has a prohibition against eating pork. So you could argue that *not* eating bacon is a possible warning sign of terrorist potential...
Getting my info from a film, I know, but part of the premise in the "Traitor" was that it was allowed to assume the traits of your enemies in order to attack them, i.e. Eating pork, drinking alcohol in order to appear western and therefore pass undetected. No idea how accurate it is, but it at least groks as far as my understanding of whackjob theology is concerned.
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More importantly, is there anyone who couldn't be classified as a terrorist?
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./ sarcasm Shhhh, we have to declare the next inanimate object the next evil incarnate.
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uhm, voting republican?
Are we not done pretending that any actionable difference exists between the two faces of the One Party?
The old "one party good, 'other' party bad" nonsense is just tiresome at this point.
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Sure there's actionable differences. We wouldn't have gotten the ACA if the Republicans had stayed in power. There's just not as much difference as many think.
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We wouldn't have gotten the ACA
From what I've seen of it so far, I don't think that would have been a bad thing. For starters, there's nothing affordable about it.
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tell that to folks who could NOT get insurance NO MATTER WHAT. I know lots of folks (i'm older) who have pre-existing conditions and they were LOCKED OUT of insurance. 100% locked out. could not get it even if they paid $2k/mo.
so, for those folks (and it COULD happen to you later on) its a godsend.
cost is not great but do you think that the american system will EVER get lower in cost? I don't think it will be allowed; too many interests in keeping cost too high and not insuring everyone (the conservativ
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Sure there's actionable differences. We would have gotten the RomneyCare if the Republicans had won in 2012. There's just not as much difference as many think.
There. FTFY.
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Sure there's actionable differences. We would have gotten the RomneyCare if the Republicans had won in 2012. There's just not as much difference as many think.
There. FTFY.
Oh, wait...
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As an outside observer I wouldn't say that is true. Both parties are very close on many issues and clearly in the pocket's of people making large donations to their campaigns, but for example the Republicans would never have introduced something like Obamacare. Unarguably Obamacare has had a very real and tangible effect on millions of people's lives, so voting one way or the other clearly does have some meaning.
Of course you are correct that both parties are pretty bad, but they are not entirely homogeneou
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its true, though, that the republicans are the main force in the 'culture of fear' that we are stuck in the middle of.
republicans are the owners of the military machine. that exists only when there is fear in us of some foreign boogeyman.
the dems are in the pockets of entertainment (as a contrast) and that's not that much of a fear-based business (other than the threat of suits from mpaa/riaa).
fear of terrorism is mostly an invention of the republicans, though. they love to see us all cower and do whateve
Welp, if it wasn't popular before (Score:2)
Now everyone who imagines themselves rebellious for having issues with one of the confused democratic governments in the world is going to love bitcoin now.
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Nobody knows WHO "invented" bitcoin. Odds are fair that bitcoin is just another NSA program to track those who are seeking to remain anonymous. Who else with a decent R&D budget would fund such a project without taking credit for it, raising awareness for their cause, or making a profit from the effort?
Sounds reasonable (Score:5, Informative)
It's a bit immature for people to be blindly making fun of this. At the risk of RTFA:
This sounds like a perfectly valid thing for someone to think about, and consider the implications of. Honestly, whatever your business (or governmental responsibility), if you aren't thinking about the impact of crypto-currency, you might be being negligent.
Re:Sounds UNreasonable (Score:5, Informative)
quite unreasonable.
don't you know the drill, by now?
if this competes with the existing power-brokers (and yes, it does) then it can't be allowed.
to stop things we don't like, we label them as child pron or terrorism.
nothing new about this; we've seen this old play redone hundreds of times during the last 10+ yrs.
this is just about controlling currency and stopping anonymity. has absolutely nothing to do with 'terror'. only an moran would buy that story.
Re:Sounds UNreasonable (Score:4, Insightful)
quite unreasonable.
don't you know the drill, by now?
if this competes with the existing power-brokers (and yes, it does) then it can't be allowed.
to stop things we don't like, we label them as child pron or terrorism.
nothing new about this; we've seen this old play redone hundreds of times during the last 10+ yrs.
this is just about controlling currency and stopping anonymity. has absolutely nothing to do with 'terror'. only an moran would buy that story.
It's about control and destroying a free and open society..
Terrorism, rebellion against the government, and being able to move wealth without government knowledge is only preventable in an authoritarian police-state type of society.
A free and open society only exists when it is possible to keep one's finances a secret from government and organize without the governments' knowledge to commit acts of terrorism and rebellion.
More government "Safety" = Less Freedom, Less Actual Safety, and Less Money for You.
Strat
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It's simply about the US losing the power to police its borders. The real reason you go through the scantron is to keep you from packing hundreds to your torso and walking out of the country. The same is true with gold. The US government hates the idea of people moving money without their consent.
PATRIOT Act has mainly been used to suppress this activity.
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The real reason you go through the scantron is to keep you from packing hundreds to your torso and walking out of the country.
What if I forgot a #2 pencil and used a pen - can the scantron still see them?
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Probably. It can also give you cancer.
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You're immature and naive if you believe that Democrats aren't being paid by the same corporate lobbyists to pursue the exact same agenda.
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What, you don't like the mandatory weekly BitCoin "news" ? :-)
Stupid headline and summary. (Score:5, Informative)
They are not investigating Bitcoin as a threat.They are investigating how crypto-currencies can be used to finance terrorism. The editors need to be fired.
Back in January, Bitcoin Magazine unearthed an unclassified memo detailing some of the CTTSO projects. "The introduction of virtual currency will likely shape threat finance by increasing the opaqueness, transactional velocity, and overall efficiencies of terrorist attacks”, the memo said.
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They are not investigating Bitcoin as a threat.They are investigating how crypto-currencies can be used to finance terrorism. The editors need to be fired.
How about we just dock their pay... Oh, right... On Slashdot these things are contributed by people who don't get paid...
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On Slashdot these things are contributed by people who don't get paid...
i think you meant "can't get paid".
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On Slashdot these things are contributed by people who don't get paid...
i think you meant "can't get paid".
LOL.. I like that one.. Thanks I needed the laugh.
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And yet you'll see the actual post was put up by someone (samzenpus) who is a paid employee. God forbid the editors actually edit anything, though, right?
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Notice I said "editors" and not "contributors"? They have different jobs. Contributors submit crap. The editors are supposed to make it look pretty and be accurate before it is displayed to the readers (us).
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They are not investigating Bitcoin as a threat.They are investigating how crypto-currencies can be used to finance terrorism.
Because the US government doesn't have enough ways of supporting terrorism as it is?
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And are worth every penny.
Hard to imagine (Score:2)
Hard to imagine a currency requiring central coordination to facilitate all transactions would be looked upon as anything other than wet dream of any government/military industry.
Stoopid government (Score:2)
They class everything as either a terrorist threat or an enemy combatant.
What's their next trick? A war on breakfast cereals? Drone strikes against the color blue?
Don't worry (Score:2)
The NSA already knows everything you do with your computer, including Bitcoin trades.
In my book (Score:2)
How to tell the reporters don't get it either (Score:2)
Clearly they both understand bitcoin enough to explain it in their own words:
They could be doing *anything* with that "money"! (Score:3)
The basic concepts of "freedom" and "privacy" are the perceived threats here.
The fundamental concept that anyone could be doing anything without first getting permission is the threat here.
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Interesting)
FYI, all other electronic money transfers in the US are required to go through money laundering and terrorist funding checks. By law the bank isn't even allowed to tell you why you can't get your money, if the scan hits a positive.
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Insightful)
And I can't even imagine how harsh would be the punishment for those who get caught laundering money for terrorists. Let's say if a big bank (i.e. HSBC, or Santander) got caught, certainly hundreds of people would go to jail, right?
I feel so safe with all these laws protecting us.
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:4, Interesting)
Be careful what you wish for [usatoday.com]. It looks like Holder is going to actually try and jail some bankers.
However, these banks will not be accused of laundering money for terrorists, except under an extremely flexible definition of "terrorist". Most likely they will be accused of evading sanctions and/or helping naughty Americans avoid tax (let's ignore that some of these Americans had left America). Unfortunately last time the USA went on the war path over sanction-evading banks it turned out that the countries the financial activity was happening in didn't have those sanctions. Another minor detail for the US Govt. Jurisdiction doesn't seem to matter to them.
I do feel like we're entering dangerous new territory with this constant beating up of banks, often under deeply questionable covers. The DoJ and Treasury dept have realised that bankers are so politically weak they can be made to do anything because people automatically assume they're guilty, and just the threat of prosecution under bogus laws can cow them into subservience - which is a problem because by seizing control of the banks they seize control of the people, who cannot do without bank accounts. Hence Operation Choke Point.
Frankly, I do not believe bankers are a part of some cigar smoking Al-Qaeda terrorist conspiracy and I'd rather they were left alone than we go down this path .... it can only lead to even more gross abuses of power than what we've already seen.
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So which bank do you work for?
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:4)
Frankly, I do not believe bankers are a part of some cigar smoking Al-Qaeda terrorist conspiracy and I'd rather they were left alone than we go down this path .... it can only lead to even more gross abuses of power than what we've already seen.
You're right. But they are members of the oligarch class who will happily watch us all end up in the streets as long as they can maintain their profits. Actually, they'd like us all in the streets, since poor people have fewer opportunities to challenge their supremacy.
You can call that paranoia if you want, but given the lobbying and politician buying activities of that group, it's clear that they are willing to sacrifice our economic and social well-being in the pursuit of more money for them.
It's ultimately self-defeating, since their profits are based on our consumer society, but they'll happily sacrifice the future for quarterly gains (and bonuses).
That's not terrorism, but it is antithetical to the ideals of freedom and opportunity for all. That we don't regulate these guys or incentivize economic opportunity and equality says a lot about how deeply these guys have their filthy paws into our government.
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Your view is not congruent with mine. Banking staff just increase their annual bonus following the sophisticated application of the Banks way of doing business - Basically take sweets from babies, steal, kill and burn to death anything in the way of increasing the takings and ones own three times annual salary bonus.
So no, its pointless trying to send people to jail for following the rules of the game.
The problem is that the regulators are basically working for the banks, as are academics, as are media comm
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> Let's say if a big bank (i.e. HSBC, or Santander) got caught, certainly hundreds of people would go to jail, right?
. /sarcasm Yes; Oh wait ...
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And I can't even imagine how harsh would be the punishment for those who get caught laundering money for terrorists. Let's say if a big bank (i.e. HSBC, or Santander) got caught, certainly hundreds of people would go to jail, right?
I feel so safe with all these laws protecting us.
Because our government would never allow a bank which financed drug dealers and fomented revolution [wordpress.com] to do business in the US, right?
Granted, this was a long time ago, but not much has changed, has it?
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Because our government would never allow a bank which financed drug dealers and fomented revolution [wordpress.com] to do business in the US, right?
Granted, this was a long time ago, but not much has changed, has it?
Actually, that same bank, among others, was recently found guilty of pretty much similar crimes [rollingstone.com]. But other than a slap on the wrist, nothing happened because:
the Justice Department, for the first time, admitted why it decided to go soft on this particular kind of criminal. It was worried that anything more than a wrist slap for HSBC might undermine the world economy. "Had the U.S. authorities decided to press criminal charges," said Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer at a press conference to announce the settlement, "HSBC would almost certainly have lost its banking license in the U.S., the future of the institution would have been under threat and the entire banking system would have been destabilized."
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:4, Informative)
And I can't even imagine how harsh would be the punishment for those who get caught laundering money for terrorists. Let's say if a big bank (i.e. HSBC, or Santander) got caught, certainly hundreds of people would go to jail, right?
I feel so safe with all these laws protecting us.
I'm so sick of seeing the HSBC case referenced by people who have no clue about the actual case. Nobody at the bank had any involvement in "laundering money for terrorists". Other people laundered money using HSBC's accounts. The HSBC employees did not follow regulatory reporting rules that might have revealed the laundering. So like any regulatory violation, they were slapped with a massive fine. It would have been ridiculous to charge anyone with a crime.
If the night security guard at a bank falls asleep, and someone robs the bank without him noticing- you wouldn't charge the security guard with bank robbery.
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If the night security guard at a bank falls asleep, and someone robs the bank without him noticing- you wouldn't charge the security guard with bank robbery.
At least they should be fired for falling asleep while the bank is robbed. Where those involved fired?
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The government doesn't really care, since the fine was against the corporation. But when you are involved in losing your employer 2 billion dollars due to a fine, you tend to get fired.
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Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, and in the last few decades law enforcement agencies on both the state and federal level have grown increasingly dependent on civil forfeiture in their insane drug war. Basically it's a guilty until proven innocent system, and good luck getting it back if the government took all your money to begin with.
This was a country with $500 and $1000 (and more) dollar bills already back in the 1920s.... and now you're suspicious if you carry more than a few hundred dollar bills. Modern hundred dollar bills that I may add have less value than a 1920s Hamilton ($10 bill).
Before anyone says it only happens to drug dealers, I had 2 friends go to CA with their life savings of $15k and a business plan get stopped in OK and the money seized and never seen again. Not an gram of drugs in the car, just some beer in the back. America looks more and more like a communist country every coming decade.
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Informative)
America looks more and more like a communist country every coming decade.
I think the words you were looking for are "totalitarian police state", or the like.
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America looks more and more like a communist country every coming decade.
I think the words you were looking for are "totalitarian police state", or the like.
I think given this speech by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to Congress [ucsb.edu] in 1938, the best description would be a fascist state. It certainly isn't communism.
The first truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is Fascism—ownership of Government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.
The American government has been bought and paid for by private interests/corporations. Under FDR's description, that makes it fascist, or nearly so. Elect Chris Christy as President and that will settle it. He is a dangerous man.
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well, Marx did say that Socialism was just the stepping stone on the path to Communism. (paraphrasing)
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:4, Insightful)
Great business minds!
Was step one of the business plan: "Withdraw every penny of their life savings in cash in order to transport it cross country by car?"
[As you know, EFTs can't get over the Rocky Mountains until the pass opens back up in the spring...]
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Insightful)
foolishness is not illegal.
carrying cash is not illegal.
carrying cash should not used as a proxy to assign guilt for some other crime.
the police should not be able to press charges against *items* and deny standing to it's owner.
civil forfeiture is an abrogation of our civil rights and we should be throwing the ones responsible for it in jail. :(
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...and, in almost every case, carrying large amounts of cash has little to no consequence.
I visit the WSOP every year, and while they accept wire transfers at the Rio cage, nearly every player brings cash -- and not just the main event players. There's thousands of people like myself playing smaller events who have thousands of dollars in cash on them at and en route to the WSOP every year.
Care to tell us the rest of the story that was worth mentioning "just some beer in the back?"
If their business plan wa
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...and, in almost every case, carrying large amounts of cash has little to no consequence.
I visit the WSOP every year, and while they accept wire transfers at the Rio cage, nearly every player brings cash -- and not just the main event players. There's thousands of people like myself playing smaller events who have thousands of dollars in cash on them at and en route to the WSOP every year.
Yeah, good for you. Many, many people have been less lucky -- and perhaps you should pay close attention to what municipalities and states you travel through with your cash. (Some stories of how crazy this can get here [newyorker.com].)
Care to tell us the rest of the story that was worth mentioning "just some beer in the back?"
Sounded like a reference to the kinds of things that allow law enforcement to arbitrarily seize assets to me. They spot something "suspicious," which is enough to constitute some minimum of "probable cause" ("I smelled something weird, and I spotted a case of beer in the back seat..."),
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Carrying more than $100,000 in cash without a approval(or was it simple notification? or declared reason?) is illegal, though.
AFAIK, you must declare cash amounts above $10,000 if you are traveling internationally to/from the US. Traveling within the US, however, there is no reporting requirement or any restriction. It's probably dumb to carry that much cash, but being dumb isn't illegal either.
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Not specifically illegal, however, if you are caught with it, it can be confiscated and accused of being part of a drug crime. Then, being a civil suit, the standards of evidence require that you to show that the property was not used in a crime, as the standard of guilt is significantly lower.
As an added bonus, if its more than one bill, some portion of the money certainly will test positive for cocaine or some other drug, so there is already evidence to be used against you if they feel they need it.
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Seriously, though, it sounds like your friends need to give 1/3 of that to a lawyer so they can get the other 2/3 back.
Yeah, good luck with that. These confiscations are notoriously hard to fight. The "friends" are probably not even an official party to some criminal proceeding -- instead, many of these cases are filed as "State of X vs. $15,000" (I wish I were kidding). Many municipalities will charge thousands of dollars in fees just for the right to file a challenge for the confiscation, so they might be out 10-20% of their money just to get the process started. Add on complicated and lengthy legal proceedings, and t
Re:Your tax dollars hard at work (Score:5, Interesting)
FYI, all other electronic money transfers in the US are required to go through money laundering and terrorist funding checks. By law the bank isn't even allowed to tell you why you can't get your money, if the scan hits a positive.
Obama administration offers $27 million in additional help for Syrian rebels
Wonder how they'll transfer it...
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I prefer the Swiss bank secrecy laws.
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You know that without a traceable currency tax dollars cease to exist right? Read Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (which on my most recent re-reading seems even more spot on) about what America would like like with online anonymous black banking.
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It would like kind of like Puerto Rico, but more high-tech.
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In those days, tax was not a percentage. You just had to pay a certain amount, or else. That's not a system that I'd like to see reinstalled.
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subject says it all.
having an economy largely based on a digital currency that is (possibly) subject to corruption by terrorists. yes, that's a real threat.
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Bitcoin has always been falling in conversion rates... it was big money to the programmer and a money loser for everybody else who touched it.
Huh? It's surely been falling of late, but it started at an exchange rate of ZERO. Being I don't know of anybody who is paying me to accept BitCoin (i.e. an exchange rate of less than zero) I don't see how your statement is true.
Not that I wouldn't agree that BTC is going to prove to be a boondoggle... It's just not as bad as you claim.
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Huh? It's surely been falling of late, but it started at an exchange rate of ZERO.
That's the dynamic of a Ponzi scheme, as is the OPs description of who benefits.
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That's the dynamic of a Ponzi scheme, as is the OPs description of who benefits.
His description of who benefits was "the programmer", which is nonsense. You don't have to be a programmer to be miner, and you certainly don't have to be "the" programmer. Anybody could/can mine bitcoins. Bitcoins may or may not turn out to be a good long term investment, but the bitcoin system has almost nothing in common with a Ponzi scheme. People claiming Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme understand neither how bitcoins work, nor how Ponzi schemes work.
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The programmer is of course the first one with access to mining, and could therefore mine coins without competition. It's a known fact that he has a significant percentage of the bitcoins from those early days. If it's a Ponzi scheme, then he is indeed the person at the top that will reap most of the rewards.
Sure, with many Ponzi schemes, those enrolled very early may also make some profit. But far fewer than imagine they will.
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Please send 10 BTC to 17Yvsma9tfiuqVP7QhsFE2VmsFpTEMy17P, I will try to duplicate your 1000% profits as proof.
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If that was a almost certain outcome, people are using it similarly to a Ponzi scheme. If not, you're doing some serious gambling there, pardner.
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Yeah, almost like the USD. Big money for those who print it and a money loser for everybody else.
USDs are only a big loser for people that stuff it under their mattresses. If you spend it shortly after receiving it, on things like rent or groceries, it will lose only an insignificant amount of value. If you invest it, then your return on that investment will compensate for expected inflation. Mild inflation is basically a tax on hoarding.
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Please send many BTC at 17Yvsma9tfiuqVP7QhsFE2VmsFpTEMy17P, the funds will be used to buy game consoles of mass distraction.
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The enemy wants to take away your freedom. The only way to stop them is to dominate, track and control every facet of life. You do believe in protecting freedom now, don't you?
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Driving with some cash makes you something unknown and you might face "civil forfeiture" depending on the area you where randomly stopped in.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/in... [forbes.com]
Enjoying a hotel or renting a car? Enjoy that friendly chat down as you make enquiries and pay your bill.
Now we see the same for online efforts unless your using one
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And to make things more fun, there are whole classes of people who can't get a bank account or credit card and according to the story the other day, http://yro.slashdot.org/story/... [slashdot.org] trades that the government don't like are getting their bank accounts closed by the helpful bank. Even if the banks are voluntarily closing undesirables accounts, it makes it hard to function in society.
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Recall the wikileaks donations saga http://www.cnet.com/news/credi... [cnet.com]
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There are already rules dealing with large volumes of cash. For example one must declare the import of $10k or more in cash. Cash is hard to transfer as it is bulky. Crypto-currencies can be transferred much more easily.
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It's always been easy enough to transport large amounts of diamonds. Yet the US government hasn't declared diamonds a terrorist threat yet.
I think the US government just went off the deep end.
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Terrorist plots run on cash not diamonds. Lets see, to transfer money by diamonds you need to do the following.
1. find someone to sell you diamonds who would have to report the transaction if it is over $10k in cash. The seller may also report you for the reward.
2. transport the diamonds to the destination with the risk involved.
3. Find someone to buy the diamonds for near the price you bought them who would also have to report the transaction if more then $10K is involved. The buyer may also report you for
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Well, our (US) government seems to think every American citizen is a terrorist, so why couldn't a non-existant thing also be a terrorist?
The US government has really lost the plot by calling math a terrorist threat. No wonder China is on course to become the world's biggest economy.
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I believe he's talking about someone who was born into a scene of angriness and greed, dominance and persecution. Whose mother was a queen, father was never seen and was never meant to be. Yeah...
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Carrousel, carrousel, carrousel[sic]...