New UK Law Empowers Authorities to Seize, Freeze, Destroy Crypto

[larry_vw_1955]

There are still elites and nobles in most EU countries. They own the land and then they long-term rent it to the plebs. The plebs think they own the land or the real estate. In reality they only own the right to use that property for a limited time. (Could be anything from a year to 100 years) We call that feudalism and it is not over in Europe.

that sounds alot like the property tax system in the usa. you only "own" it as long as you keep paying your annual property taxes but as soon as you stop doing that, the state will sell your property at a foreclosure tax sale and there will be a new owner and you will get evicted from your home or property. you don't own land in the usa either. stop paying your property taxes and see how long your name stays on the deed. 

[larry_vw_1955]

Mandatory reporting of crypto/crypto trades is bad because the amount of paperwork will make crypto unusable for everyday use. Also this means once the government knows that you own crypto, it is very difficult, next to impossible to hide that crypto from the government again. One option is to sell the crypto for fiat, pay the taxes, then buy crypto again, without reporting it. Which is fine, except that, if I understand you correctly, it is illegal to buy crypto without reporting that.

technically you can buy crypto in the usa without having to report it. it's only when you exchange it for a different crypto or sell it for cash that you have to indicate that on your tax return by checking a box. of course, if you're using a centralized exchange like coinbase here in the usa, they do report to the irs so theoretically they could tell the irs every single transaction did using their service. including all your purchases.

Things are changing and they are gradually enforcing KYC on all companies that work with crypto. Given the direction we are headed, I expect that they will introduce stricter reporting requirements in EU too, but in a few years. I hope that we have 4-5 years, maybe more, until that happens. So one can use that time to hide his wallets from the prying eyes of the governments.

bitcoin really needs a way to be transacted "off chain" so that prying eyes can't see what's going on just like you can use paper money without them knowing what you spent it on.... because right now, if you buy anything using bitcoin in the usa, well that's a taxable event that has to be reported. no one wants to have to do that and no one should HAVE to do that.

[btcinfo891]

technically you can buy crypto in the usa without having to report it. it's only when you exchange it for a different crypto or sell it for cash that you have to indicate that on your tax return by checking a box. of course, if you're using a centralized exchange like coinbase here in the usa, they do report to the irs so theoretically they could tell the irs every single transaction did using their service. including all your purchases.

bitcoin really needs a way to be transacted "off chain" so that prying eyes can't see what's going on just like you can use paper money without them knowing what you spent it on.... because right now, if you buy anything using bitcoin in the usa, well that's a taxable event that has to be reported. no one wants to have to do that and no one should HAVE to do that.

Indeed, it seems that the originally BTC was invented as yet another type of cash. It has many of the properties of physical cash. Its transactions are irreversible, wallets don't have owner's identity attached to them, you cannot lock the wallets, or invalidate coins, etc. It does not replicate all the properties of physical cash, but it is close enough.

However governments attempt to treat crypto wallets as yet another type of bank accounts and the crypto itself and electronic bank money. They will not stop until they regulate it to the point where it is no different from ordinary bank money.

Regarding the ability to transact bitcoin off-chain, I think that the closest thing to off-chain transactions that we have now for BTC is the Lightning Network which only stores aggregated transaction data in the blockchain. However this doesn't really solve the problem where you have to report all of your transactions to the government.

So this is yet another proof that governments treat crypto as yet another kind of bank money. There is one difference, though. With banks they can get a full list of your transactions to/from your account and with crypto this is not possible because they don't know taxpayers' wallets, so they shift the reporting burden onto the taxpayers.

For practical purposes there are two kinds of trades that governments cannot trace easily. The first kind are some of the online crypto<->crypto trades (DEXes, wallets that provide atomic swaps, non-KYC CEXes, etc.). And the other kind are P2P trades where the traders meet in person and exchange crypto for physical cash.

[larry_vw_1955]

For practical purposes there are two kinds of trades that governments cannot trace easily. The first kind are some of the online crypto<->crypto trades (DEXes, wallets that provide atomic swaps, non-KYC CEXes, etc.).

usa citizens are supposed to report all of those every time they do one, its a taxable event.

And the other kind are P2P trades where the traders meet in person and exchange crypto for physical cash.

the problem with that is, you still have to do an on chain transaction to send the bitcoin to the buyer's address. if there was someway that the on-chain transaction could be bypassed so bitcoin could just be exchanged physically off chain then that would take uncle sam out of the loop which would be a good thing. i know that's getting a bit off topic but maybe people in the UK would like to be able to do that too so they could snub their nose at the king. 

[avikz]

ok but what's with wanting to destroy privacy coins? confiscate them from people and then burn them. that's just kind of like throwing money away.

I guess they want to remove privacy coins from circulation? Which is definitely going to work because there's obviously nothing worse for a coin's value than reducing its supply (/s)

Not just UK, but US also wants to destroy the privacy coins. Burning those coins is a part of the law because these enforcement agencies want to wipe out privacy coins. If they sell it off, someone else will have to buy it. So the coins will remain in circulation. So that's why the authorities want to burn it rather than selling it after taking its possession.

Such kind of regulations do not surprise me anymore! This is bound to happen! I think such regulations will be further tightened as time goes by. It's a full blown war again cryptos and especially against privacy coins.

[larry_vw_1955]

Not just UK, but US also wants to destroy the privacy coins. Burning those coins is a part of the law because these enforcement agencies want to wipe out privacy coins. If they sell it off, someone else will have to buy it. So the coins will remain in circulation. So that's why the authorities want to burn it rather than selling it after taking its possession.

Such kind of regulations do not surprise me anymore! This is bound to happen! I think such regulations will be further tightened as time goes by. It's a full blown war again cryptos and especially against privacy coins.

i'm not too bullish on a cryptocurrency if exchanges delist it and no one wants to have anything to do with it kind of like monero. but somehow monero seems to still be around but i'm not sure why. it should be dead by now.

[btcinfo891]

Not just UK, but US also wants to destroy the privacy coins. Burning those coins is a part of the law because these enforcement agencies want to wipe out privacy coins. If they sell it off, someone else will have to buy it. So the coins will remain in circulation. So that's why the authorities want to burn it rather than selling it after taking its possession.

Such kind of regulations do not surprise me anymore! This is bound to happen! I think such regulations will be further tightened as time goes by. It's a full blown war again cryptos and especially against privacy coins.

i'm not too bullish on a cryptocurrency if exchanges delist it and no one wants to have anything to do with it kind of like monero. but somehow monero seems to still be around but i'm not sure why. it should be dead by now.

Monero is not dead exactly because it provides something that Bitcoin does not, private transactions. Essentially Monero is Bitcoin done right.

[larry_vw_1955]

Monero is not dead exactly because it provides something that Bitcoin does not, private transactions. Essentially Monero is Bitcoin done right.

so if satoshi would have done bitcoin "right", monero wouldn't exist. but then bitcoin would be outlawed/delisted from every exchange pretty much so wouldn't it be useless?

USA citizens for example are WELL insulated from having access to dealing with monero. if regulated exchanges like coinbase don't even support it then for most americans, monero doesn't exist.

[btcinfo891]

so if satoshi would have done bitcoin "right", monero wouldn't exist. but then bitcoin would be outlawed/delisted from every exchange pretty much so wouldn't it be useless?

If Bitcoin had the privacy features of Monero from the start, it wouldn't be useless, just like Monero isn't useless. The users of the the "proper" Bitcoin would be fewer than the users of the current one, but their number would probably be greater than the number of the Monero users, because some of the current Bitcoin users would use the "proper" Bitcoin despite it being outlawed. And I am not really sure that the "proper" Bitcoin would be outlawed, maybe it would be in Monero's position, frowned upon, but not outlawed. After all torrents are not outlawed, even though most of the content distributed there is not licensed by its respective owners.

USA citizens for example are WELL insulated from having access to dealing with monero. if regulated exchanges like coinbase don't even support it then for most americans, monero doesn't exist.

My impression is that most of the Bitcoin users in USA don't really use it as a currency, but as an investment. And this is probably true for Bitcoin users worldwide, not just in USA. So these people would be happy with any financial instrument that is unregulated or weakly regulated, liquid and highly volatile. My guess is that if there were a "proper" Bitcoin, they could use some financial instrument derived from the "proper" Bitcoin, ETF or just move to some other completely unrelated financial instrument.

[larry_vw_1955]

so if satoshi would have done bitcoin "right", monero wouldn't exist. but then bitcoin would be outlawed/delisted from every exchange pretty much so wouldn't it be useless?

If Bitcoin had the privacy features of Monero from the start, it wouldn't be useless, just like Monero isn't useless.

we gave the governments a leg up by not making bitcoin have the features of monero because now they will never settle for less. wouldn't you agree?

My impression is that most of the Bitcoin users in USA don't really use it as a currency, but as an investment.

it's not even clear to me that monero is really a "good" investment. it could one day fail and go to zero. the likelihood of that happening is more than bitcoin doing the same thing. plus, i've heard some sketchy things about monero such as someone could be inflating the supply if it and no one would know about it because apparently monero is hard to audit the utxo set in full. bad investment...in my opinion.

oh, you were talking about bitcoin as an investment, not monero. sorry! 

[takuma sato]

ok but what's with wanting to destroy privacy coins? confiscate them from people and then burn them. that's just kind of like throwing money away.

I guess they want to remove privacy coins from circulation? Which is definitely going to work because there's obviously nothing worse for a coin's value than reducing its supply (/s)

The UK has been at the forefront of the anti privacy laws for years. You are guilty by default until you manage to prove otherwise the moment you try to protect your privacy in any way. From downloading Tails to mixing your coins because you don't want to disclose your funds to the parties you are paying. The government is run by idiots that don't understand the concept of basic privacy being needed for your security, so instead they criminalize the whole thing. And yes, the State owns everything, private property is an illusion, they just temporarily let you own stuff.

[tread93]

https://beincrypto.com/uk-new-crypto-law-seizure/

The new regulations empower law enforcement agencies to seize cryptocurrency holdings without the necessity of making an arrest first.

and this:

The new guidelines grant authorities the power to confiscate items like written passwords or memory sticks that could assist in criminal inquiries and to transfer illicit cryptos to government-controlled wallets, effectively cutting off criminal access.

and then this:

Furthermore, authorities can now destroy specific digital assets, notably privacy coins.


apparently things were headed in this direction since last year. so it shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. but it's still something to understand how things work now in the UK....

you don't have to be arrested to have your bitcoin taken away from you there in the UK. that's the bottom line.   and if you're using monero it sounds like they want to destroy it.

This is wild. Such a power grab to make this kind of regulation & opress your people. The UK is so much more tightly regulated in general so it comes as no suprise to me that some kind of policy like this would become the norm but still its just such a slap in the face to any holders that fall in that monetary jurisdiction.

[btcinfo891]

we gave the governments a leg up by not making bitcoin have the features of monero because now they will never settle for less. wouldn't you agree?

Do you mean that at this point the governments are used to the bitcoin transactions being transparent so if the developers add privacy features to bitcoin, then the governments will enact even more restrictive laws? That's probably true. However I suspect that governments will continue introducing more restrictive legislation until they turn crypto into just another kind of electronic bank money. And this will happen regardless of the presence or lack of privacy features in bitcoin. After all if all entities that make crypto transactions are required by law to demand KYC from the other party, then it doesn't really matter if the crypto transaction is private or not. For practical purposes it won't be private. If you don't report your crypto transactions to the government then the other partie(s) will do that and the government will punish you for not reporting them.

As Philip Zimmermann said “If privacy is outlawed, only outlaws will have privacy.”

[larry_vw_1955]

Do you mean that at this point the governments are used to the bitcoin transactions being transparent so if the developers add privacy features to bitcoin, then the governments will enact even more restrictive laws?

yes, that's what i meant. they are not going to settle for bitcoin ever having more privacy than it started out with.

As Philip Zimmermann said “If privacy is outlawed, only outlaws will have privacy.”

replace "privacy" with "guns". and you begin to understand why banning privacy is not really a good idea either...

The UK has been at the forefront of the anti privacy laws for years. You are guilty by default until you manage to prove otherwise the moment you try to protect your privacy in any way. From downloading Tails to mixing your coins because you don't want to disclose your funds to the parties you are paying. The government is run by idiots that don't understand the concept of basic privacy being needed for your security, so instead they criminalize the whole thing.

maybe that's why i never hear people in the usa saying "you know, i'm looking for a nice place to retire. how about the uk ? " that would be a very strange thing to hear someone say indeed!

And yes, the State owns everything, private property is an illusion, they just temporarily let you own stuff.

if they own everything then they should be the ones paying property taxes on it, not me.