Darknet Crypto Kingpin JokerStash Retires After Illicit $1 Billion Run (reuters.com) 28
The kingpin or kingpins of the world's biggest illicit credit card marketplace have retired after making an estimated fortune of over $1 billion in cryptocurrency, according to research by blockchain analysis firm Elliptic shared with Reuters. From the report: The "Joker's Stash" marketplace, where stolen credit cards and identity data traded hands for bitcoin and other digital coins, ceased operations this month, Elliptic said on Friday, in what it called a rare example of such a site bowing out on its own terms. Criminal use of cryptocurrencies has long worried regulators, with U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde calling last month for tighter oversight. While terrorist financing and money laundering are top of law-enforcement concerns, narcotics, fraud, scams and ransomware are among the chief areas of illegal use of digital currencies, according to Elliptic co-founder Tom Robinson. Joker's Stash was launched in 2014, with its anonymous founder "JokerStash" -- which could be one or more people -- posting messages in both Russian and English, Elliptic said. It was available on the regular web and via the darknet, which hosts marketplaces selling contraband.
Very obliging (Score:3)
It's nice of the criminals kingpins to record all their transactions in a publicly accessible, digitally signed and traceable block chain.
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Re: Very obliging (Score:2)
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"you're as delusional as those Republican Senators who see nothing wrong with a so-called president directing his supporters to overthrow an election and execute elected officials."
uuhh.. you got a source on that one bud?
Re:Very obliging (Score:5, Informative)
Criminals use bitcoin mixers [bitcoinmagazine.com], which effectively allow for an easy, cheap means to launder cash (by contrast, conventional laundering services usually take about half the cut and leave you with a much higher risk of getting caught - as well as requiring having either physical cash, or risking working through a banking system that's trying to detect criminal activity). With a bitcoin mixer, the criminal's purchases end up with zero connection to the original wallet through which the crime was committed.
The intense resistance you get from many cryptocurrency advocates when you suggest the use of auditable coins (e.g. where investigators with a signed court order can unmask a real identity of a wallet, but otherwise transactions are anonymous - among a variety of other potential similar features) IMHO tells me all I need to know about their attitudes towards living in a society where laws can actually exist and be enforceable.
and the exchanges just get off or will they bank (Score:2)
and the exchanges just get off or will they be forced to act like banks?
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With a bitcoin mixer, the criminal's purchases end up with zero connection to the original wallet through which the crime was committed.
Ultimately the authorities can trace coins sent through a "mixer" to the mixing service, And the act of providing a mixing service or putting your coins through a mixing service is itself a crime which taints any funds after they come out from the mixing service.
Re: Very obliging (Score:2)
Re: Very obliging (Score:4, Interesting)
If you are tumbling coins that were in anyway ill-gotten, it's pretty squarely money laundering under 18 U.S.C. 1956: https://www.law.cornell.edu/us... [cornell.edu].
Even if the coins you put in were all obtained legitimately, a strict reading of that law would seem to indicate that it's possible you could be charged with money laundering if you knew or reasonably should have known that other participants in the transaction were putting in tainted funds. That said, I doubt this would be very likely as prosecutors don't typically like having to prove people's internal state.
Re: Very obliging (Score:2, Interesting)
Mixing services pretend that it's actually about privacy. E.g. "I don't want my landlord looking at the transaction history of the wallet that I paid them from and seeing that my salary payments have gone up", and whatnot.
In reality, they're almost exclusively used by criminals.
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A coin tumbler can in theory be a completely automated, anonymous server running somewhere. Very difficult to trace the owners and they can reside in any nation, including one where extradition is disallowed and local laws make their activity legal or only mildly punished.
With ethereum and smart contracts you could encode part of the tumbler into the blockchain itself, though there are issues. A tumbler has to use an RNG to scramble the transactions, and have secret information, neither of which are compa
Great! (Score:2)
It's nice of everyone bidding up the price of bitcoin to help out these fine, upstanding citizens, who of course have no interest in bitcoin due to its anonymity, ease of launderability, and irrevocability of transfers vs. all other digital transfer systems, an of course, being vastly easier to move around than cash (with no risks from marking, serial numbers, residues, or transfer/distribution networks, and with far cheaper laundering services)
Re:Great! (Score:4, Interesting)
Also crying about illicit uses of crypto currencies is stupid. More USD is used for all of the same things every year and has been for decades upon decades in the past. No one climbs on a high horse about not using US dollars for those reasons.
In your particular case I'd want to know how you feel about Tesla buying a bunch of BitCoin recently. You're one of the people who's more of a staunch supporter of the company here. Are you going to dump them and any stock you own for aiding and abetting all of these criminals? Put your morals where your mouth is.
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If USD is so great for hiding transactions, when was the last time you saw a ransomware group demand payment in USD? When was the last time you saw an equivalent of the Twitter bitcoin / ethereum scams telling people to send USD? Petty in-person crime still relies heavily on cash, but for engaging in crime over large distances, laundering large sums, or evading sanctions, cryptocurrencies have become the go-to solution.
It's also a favourite target of hackers, as anyone who's not blind has surely noticed ov
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Going to take Elon to take for enabling all of this? I don't have any crypto currency myself, but I don't think it's some kind of inherently evil thing either. The money that Tes
Re: Great! (Score:1)
I did reduce leverage and have blocked half a dozen Tesla bulls on Twitter for constant cryptovangelism. Hoping for a shareholder resolution to reverse the decision. You should be able to tell from my comments that I'm not happy about this.
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Next batman comic title? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Darknet Crypto Kingpin JokerStash Retires After Illicit $1 Billion Run "
Should not be something from the real media.
Jokerstash is not the reporter's fault. I can understand Darknet, it's the kind of jargon the media loves. but Crypto and Kingpin are not helpful, nor is retires, illicit, or run.
It could have read:
Darknet criminal marketplace "Jokerstash" closes itself after making an estimated $1 Billion.
2020 may have seemed more like something from a comic-book than real life, but lets try to get a little bit more mature for 2021.
Wise. (Score:2)
When you make a billion the temptation is to stick it out for the next billion. But foolish. The first billion makes a huge difference to your life compared to the second, but the chance of getting caught goes way up.
This person has enough to live it large forever, so it was very wise to call it.
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Sure, but this was a deeply illegal one remember. The wise thing is to cash out when you have enough money, not to chase those extra dollars. Selling has a risk.
I maintain that it was wise.
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the whole goddam point of being a billionaire is so you can do whatever the fuck you want. who cares? you're a billionaire.
Nature abhors a vacuum (Score:2)
But then again, maybe someone WANTS a real criminal to step in so they can nab them.