Owners of BitMEX, a Leading Bitcoin Exchange, Face Criminal Charges (nytimes.com) 24
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: American authorities brought criminal charges on Thursday against the owners of one of the world's biggest cryptocurrency trading exchanges, BitMEX, accusing them of allowing the Hong Kong-based company to launder money and engage in other illegal transactions. Federal prosecutors in Manhattan indicted the chief executive of BitMEX, Arthur Hayes, and three co-owners: Benjamin Delo, Samuel Reed and Gregory Dwyer. Mr. Dwyer was arrested in Massachusetts on Thursday, while the other three men remained at large, authorities said.
Prosecutors said BitMEX had taken few steps to limit customers even after being informed that the exchange was being used by hackers to launder stolen money, and by people in countries under sanctions, like Iran. "BitMEX made itself available as a vehicle for money laundering and sanctions violations," the indictment released on Thursday said. BitMEX has handled more than $1.5 billion of trades each day recently, making it one of the five biggest exchanges on most days. BitMEX and Mr. Hayes have been known for pushing the limits in the unregulated cryptocurrency industry.
After it was founded in 2014, BitMEX grew popular by allowing traders to buy and sell contracts tied to the value of Bitcoin -- known as derivatives, or futures -- with few of the restrictions and rules that were in place in other exchanges. That allowed investors to take out enormous loans and make risky trades. The relaxed attitude also made it possible for people all over the world to easily move money in and out of BitMEX without the basic identity checks that can prevent money laundering. In August, BitMEX put in place some of those verification checks.
Prosecutors said BitMEX had taken few steps to limit customers even after being informed that the exchange was being used by hackers to launder stolen money, and by people in countries under sanctions, like Iran. "BitMEX made itself available as a vehicle for money laundering and sanctions violations," the indictment released on Thursday said. BitMEX has handled more than $1.5 billion of trades each day recently, making it one of the five biggest exchanges on most days. BitMEX and Mr. Hayes have been known for pushing the limits in the unregulated cryptocurrency industry.
After it was founded in 2014, BitMEX grew popular by allowing traders to buy and sell contracts tied to the value of Bitcoin -- known as derivatives, or futures -- with few of the restrictions and rules that were in place in other exchanges. That allowed investors to take out enormous loans and make risky trades. The relaxed attitude also made it possible for people all over the world to easily move money in and out of BitMEX without the basic identity checks that can prevent money laundering. In August, BitMEX put in place some of those verification checks.
Kind of missing the point though (Score:4, Insightful)
There are now at least three reasons to start a cryptocurrency exchange:
1) Make a decent living curating trades like the credit card folks.
2) Make a small fortune stealing coins from your customers and then throwing your hands up in mock surprise while uttering, "We been hacked!"
3) Make a large fortune cleaning people's dirty money.
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Shouldn't money laundering be #1? It is after all the original purpose of such exchanges.
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Re:Kind of missing the point though (Score:4, Interesting)
Shouldn't money laundering be #1? It is after all the original purpose of such exchanges.
Why use crypto, banks are FAR better at money laundering.
Just this year they have been caught laundered more money than the entire bitcoin economy. The kicker is, since they only get fined when caught and nobody goes to jail it is a far less risky operation.
https://fortune.com/2020/03/11... [fortune.com]
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Ah, but banks (mostly) only launder money for the right kind of people. Everyone else must find an alternative.
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Ah, but banks (mostly) only launder money for the right kind of people. Everyone else must find an alternative.
I suspect not, especially since any money laundered through bitcoin must pass through banks in the first place. You may as well add any money laundering amount done through bitcoin (I don't deny it happens) to the banks tally as well.
The only difference is, with bitcoin, you have to do it out in the open whereas with banks. they are experts at concealing it for you.
The point is the Gold Rush mentality (Score:2)
God awful as I thought the slashdot mobile interface is, I just learned it's much worse than that.
Anyway, I finally got around to reading some books about Bitcoin and blockchain and they are obviously horrendous scams. New technologies in search of solutions to Old problems. All of the non wasteful algorithms can be implemented with other tools. So what's the difference?
It's the Gold Rush mentality displayed by a few people. There's always some gold diggers running around, and this is their latest imaginary
Bitcoin is real - Only Bitcoin is real! (Score:1)
Bitcoin covers the vacant niche left by the end of the Gold Standard. Bitcoin is really decentralized and useful. Using buzzwords like Cryptos or Blockchains are absurds. This is the same as promoting Lead as money because Lead was useful to make pipes:
https://unchained-capital.com/... [unchained-capital.com]
https://mediu [medium.com]
The point is the Gold Rush mentality (Score:2)
No evidence of understanding basic math from person with links.
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The people who wrote these articles have the proper knowledge. Bitcoin is a genuine invention, and the only innovation in money for the last 1000 years.
Cryptos outside Bitcoin are a domain filled by con-artists. You should read the Bitcoin white paper and forget about a book promoting buzzwords like Cryptos or Blockchains. This i
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No, that is an evasion, not a response. Why should I waste time on you?
But let's try a trivial question. How can you embed the current block's checksum in the current block of the chain?
I think you're just a young fool, but I may be projecting from my own youth. I was definitely much more ignorant and possibly even more stupid back then. I did some wild and crazy gambling in those salad days, though money never interested me enough to gamble in that direction.
Only Bitcoin matters! Sound money matters! (Score:1)
A block contains only the hash of the previous block.The validity of the last block is easily verifiable.
After 11 years, Bitcoin is not for young fools, Bitcoin is already in the portfolio of a public company: https://ir.microstrategy.com/n... [microstrategy.com]
Bitcoin is the digitization of Gold; If Bitcoin succeeds Gold will become obsolete. Most people can't understand why G
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I am frankly shocked that you understand that much, though you were supposed to complain it was a trick question. If you actually had mathematical sophistication, then you would have gone into the algorithm or perhaps even a theoretical discussion of a different kind of self-signing checksum.
Instead, you apparently want to argue about the age of the fool? Or maybe that it matters how many fools there are? Or why the fools can't pick a new fad?
Or maybe you're just a gamester who thinks you're going to be the
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Bitcoin is a system growing without a central planner. You can't stop it; Nobody can't! What you think, or what I think, don't matter.
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Actually, any major nation could stop it. Just overwhelm the Bitcoin blockchain and force a fork. Repeat as necessary on each branch until any real money the suckers have gambled is gone. The actual problem is that only the other nations could save Bitcoin, but they won't. Therefore the real question is why Bitcoin is still alive.
Anyway, you're right about one thing. The "discussion" is pointless and can be regarded as terminated.
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It's point three that will get them into the most trouble, because that's where they're really stepping on the toes of the establishment banks
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"Now they're fucking with us where we eat."
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4) Honeypot.
Of course, you use points 1-3 to fund the subsequent law enforcement activities enabled by point 4.
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Bitcoin is the next Money - Beyond Manipulations! (Score:2)
Here is a way to upgrade treasury bonds: https://ir.microstrategy.com/n... [microstrategy.com]
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The failure of Gold is the reason why our monies are inflated (QE...). Gold was confiscated in 1933, and now most people don't care about it. Using Gold to store your wealth is a dead end. At this stage Bitcoin is not gambling anymore.
"Here's what I continue to tell people: name to me a business that was analog and got digitized, and the digital version is smaller than the analog version. It doesn't happen. It's because digitization brings all kinds of advantages.
It's a market-expanding technology." Pompli