Monero Emerges As Crypto of Choice For Cybercriminals (arstechnica.com) 64
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: While bitcoin leaves a visible trail of transactions on its underlying blockchain, the niche "privacy coin" monero was designed to obscure the sender and receiver, as well as the amount exchanged. As a result, it has become an increasingly sought-after tool for criminals such as ransomware gangs, posing new problems for law enforcement. "We've seen ransomware groups specifically shifting to monero," said Bryce Webster-Jacobsen, director of intelligence at GroupSense, a cyber security group that has helped a growing number of victims pay out ransoms in monero. "[Cyber criminals] have recognized the ability for mistakes to be made using bitcoin that allow blockchain transactions to reveal their identity."
Russia-linked REvil, the notorious ransomware group believed to be behind the attack this month on meatpacker JBS, has removed the option of paying in bitcoin this year, demanding monero only, according to Brett Callow, threat analyst at Emsisoft. Meanwhile, both DarkSide, the group blamed for the Colonial Pipeline hack, and Babuk, which was behind the attack on Washington DC police this year, allow payments in either cryptocurrency but charge a 10 to 20 percent premium to victims paying in riskier bitcoin, experts say. Justin Ehrenhofer, a cryptocurrency compliance expert and member of the monero developer community, said that at the beginning of 2020, its use by ransomware gangs was "a rounding error." Today he estimates that about 10 to 20 percent of ransoms are paid in monero and that the figure will probably rise to 50 percent by the end of the year.
Russia-linked REvil, the notorious ransomware group believed to be behind the attack this month on meatpacker JBS, has removed the option of paying in bitcoin this year, demanding monero only, according to Brett Callow, threat analyst at Emsisoft. Meanwhile, both DarkSide, the group blamed for the Colonial Pipeline hack, and Babuk, which was behind the attack on Washington DC police this year, allow payments in either cryptocurrency but charge a 10 to 20 percent premium to victims paying in riskier bitcoin, experts say. Justin Ehrenhofer, a cryptocurrency compliance expert and member of the monero developer community, said that at the beginning of 2020, its use by ransomware gangs was "a rounding error." Today he estimates that about 10 to 20 percent of ransoms are paid in monero and that the figure will probably rise to 50 percent by the end of the year.
Finally a decent Monero pump (Score:2, Insightful)
I was worried no one was going to shill Monero on slashdot, and here we are with a huge vote of confidence for it.
If you're concerned about the future value of a currency whose entire use case is based around secretly buying and selling drugs, reddit has you covered with this reassuring analysis:
https://i.redd.it/ez2dts8owb57... [i.redd.it]
(there's apparently an entire subreddit devoted to "Monero-chan", likely a 4chan colony on reddit or something)
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If it's a -chan embodiment it surely came from 4chan. I don't think Redditors are that creative. I remember the hilarity of "Corona-Chan," the anthromoprhoization of COVID-19, popular in early 2020, and all the offensive and NSFW but oftentimes hilarious drawings of her.
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> I was worried no one was going to shill Monero on slashdot
In that case.. use ZCash (ZEC) instead: https://komodoplatform.com/en/... [komodoplatform.com]
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The crooks are switching to Monero because the FBI publicly blabbed about how they recovered much of the Bitcoin from the Colonial Pipeline attack.
When you have a covert advantage over your adversaries, STFU.
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What makes you think the FBI doesn't want the crooks to switch to Monero?
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The FBI doesn't want crooks on Monero because they have no way to trace Monero in a provable fashion as they do with open chain crypto.
If someone somewhere in the world DOES know how to trace Monero- maybe the NSA does or whatever- then the fact that they aren't willing to reveal this fact is itself a great argument for a criminal to use it, as your standard criminal wouldn't be worth revealing such a capability. Apparently, even the most powerful criminals using Monero aren't- if indeed, anyone can crack
Re:Finally a decent Shitcoin pump (Score:1)
Of course they could because nobody uses monero. With Bitcoin you could hide in the crowd, the usage is enormous, with monero you can't. Because, the cryptography implemented is incompatible with any scaling solution. If this cryptography was well suited, it would have been already implemented on the Bitcoin base layer.
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This doesn't make Monero relevant. Monero can"t even compete against Ethereum which was designed as a 100% premined scam. Ethereum relies on heavy marketing and an unlimited number of suckers: https://twitter.com/arbedout/s... [twitter.com]
A shitcoin is anything promoted as a form of money whose supply is easy to increase. In other words, anything other than gold or bitcoin.
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The only shit around here is coming out of your mouth.
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These "people" are unable to understand why Gold was money. They will get rekt and learn the hard way.
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Are you really that dense?
XMR is a privacy coin.
Nobody really expects it to be worth a lot of money. It isn't an investment. In fact, it's probably better for XMR not to gain or lose much value vs. the fiat people spend directly buying it or indirectly by mining it.
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Oh it's you isn't it? Just couldn't stay away. Are you actively upset that criminals prefer XMR to BTC?
Honestly, some people.
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You confuse operating as the Mafia or operating as a Public Justice System, an important branch of government, which must substantiate ALL OF IT'S activities to the public. All of it's methods, which were applied, how they were applied and what was recovered. The court is meant to be public, all of it's actions public, justice dies in the dark. Secrets are easier, so is killing everyone on the planet through a viral plague, you do not do the easy thing, you do the right thing. the just thing.
All internet ac
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However Criminals have always used items of little useful value to proxy as an exchange now instead of paying millions for worthless art as a cover for drug money exchanges they use crypto
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"The crooks" switched to Monero ages ago when they figured out it was easy to dump malware on computers and run cpu-based XMR miners. The difference now is that I think people are more confident in their ability to cash out with XMR.
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You'd think the foil hat nutjobs who frequent slashdot would be all over Monero. Isn't privacy and strong cryptography popular here?
Re: Finally a decent Monero pump (Score:2)
Yup thats why i use cash
Re: Finally a decent Shitcoin pump (Score:2, Insightful)
Another attempt to pump a pointless Shitcoin: Monero
Adding a token to a cryptography unsuited for the job, makes the whole project irrelevant. This applies to Monero. This applies to Zcash as well. Zcash is a pure scam!
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Who mods up this moron?
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Still waiting for you to contribute anything of substance.
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How about when security cameras have enough resolution to automatically read the bill serial numbers?
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Sure, if you can also track every transaction and its history on a camera network that was networked together then yeah, it will be time to exchange cattle.
Well . . . DUH (Score:2)
While bitcoin leaves a visible trail of transactions on its underlying blockchain, the niche "privacy coin" monero was designed to obscure the sender and receiver, as well as the amount exchanged. As a result, it has become an increasingly sought-after tool for criminals such as ransomware gangs
No shit, Sherlock.
People engaged in legitimate business want/need a record of transactions. People engaged in criminal activities want/need the opposite.
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I still wouldn't want people seeing my bank balance. I also wouldn't want business associates seeing who I do suppIier or customer transactions with and for how mu... come to think of it privacy makes sense for any perfectly legitimate business that wants to stay in business.
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some people just don't like giving government any more money to squander than they have to. The US gov'ts thirst for tax revenue is odd though, given that this past year has shown a pretty remarkable ability for the US gov't to simply print money out of thin air.
That said foreign aid, foreign wars, and vote harvesting initiatives disguised as social programs -- hard pass. i'd rather keep my money for myself.
Good (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not saying I'm a cybercriminal, but considering that cash is the "number one choice for criminals" and if it were invented today it'd be demonized as "dangerously private," it makes me want to check out Monero.
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Anything that has privacy in it tends to be demonized as for criminal use. Heck, even PGP was called a tool for terrorists back in the early 1990s.
Now that the press is calling Monero out, time to sell the Doge and go XMR as all the wannabe outlaws go this route.
Re: Good (Score:2)
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But if I prefer cash, would it make me a papyrocriminal?
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Agree 100% .... but FWIW? I had a similar discussion recently with an attorney I know, and his counter-argument is that cash was always a little more difficult for the criminal element, because it takes up a lot of physical space in large sums. (The guy with suitcases full of cash has always aroused suspicion, etc.)
So in that sense, I guess they fear e-currencies more because a truly anonymous one allows pretty much unlimited amounts of money to change hands with a few clicks, and no real visual evidence to
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Re: Good (Score:2)
Every note has a unique serial. Machines feed you them one at a time recording each. Matching who paid who is not hard at all. It's a fill in the blanks game and banks see all transactions from many people in order to fill in many blanks.
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A quick bit of research suggests that mining Monero is unprofitable. Does it still function reasonably well for transactions even if people aren't mining new coins?
Crypto? (Score:4, Interesting)
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It still is. Not all of us are overwhelmed by words with more than 6 letters....
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I also remember when "cybernetics" referred to robotics and control/feedback systems, instead of doing stuff on the Internet.
I'm OK with the word "app" short for "application program", as long as people understand we've used application programs decades before there were "smart"phones.
Why is it "Russia linked"? (Score:1)
Unless it's Chinese or Russian cybercriminals i'm not seeing nationality mentioned.
Anyone old enough to remember what came to be known as the "Credibility Gap" in Vietnam war reporting?
This is the same kind of garbage we're seeing here.
Re: Why is it "Russia linked"? (Score:2)
Anyone old enough to remember what came to be known as the "Credibility Gap" in Vietnam war reporting?
Considering that was over 50 years that the term was being applied... No.
Monero is auditable (Score:4, Interesting)
Monero - Created by the NSA for the FBI (Score:2)
This explains the recent market action (Score:4, Insightful)
Russia-linked REvil, the notorious ransomware group believed to be behind the attack this month on meatpacker JBS, has removed the option of paying in bitcoin this year, demanding monero only,
Bitcoin is slumping as its criminal user base deserts it for a crypto that is even better at transferring ransoms.
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Bitcoin was never well suited for illegal activity, it was just new so it took a little while for law enforcement to catch up. Criminals are often the first to embrace new technology, corporations and governments generally lag a long way behind.
Probably not that good either (Score:3)
I mean, tracing BC is trivial. All you need to do is regulate the mixers and then everything is just there. I doubt Monero will hold up for long, the design is not nearly as good as many people believe and security, in particular anonymity, is extremely hard to get right.
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Monero had cryptography bugs, and nobody cares about it because Monero is pointless. Adding a token around a random feature is a a very good strategy to create a new pump & dumb scheme. At the end of the day, the only thing you got was a pump & dump scheme...
Classic Propaganda (Score:3)
Monero is about digitizing the right to anonymously spend money, just as you can with cash. It's really the only cryptocoin that takes this seriously.
The government is so intoxicated with their power, they think individual's rights just aren't important. So nonsense like this article get circulated to "educate" us to associate taking privacy rights seriously with supporting organized crime, terrorism, cartels, and prostitution rings. Bullshit.
I'm not interested in giving up privacy rights so that energy tycoons can avoid embarrassment and expense because they failed to take infrastructure security seriously. I don't support contining the war on terrorism. Bin Laden and ISIS are dead, get over it. I'm not interested in perpetuate failed prohibition policies. The racist war on drugs is a far bigger atrocity than ransomware gangs. Sorry, I really don't care about prosecuting money laundering either. The only way to combat cartels and traffickers is to abolish the prohibitions that force them to exist to satisfy demand. You don't get to decide what people do with their money, sorry.
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Monero is not designed to be money; Monero is a solution in search for a problem. In the meantime, they are trying to pump a last time the (not needed) token.