The other side of decentralization

[Btcdeybodi]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFCC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

[Localhostspeed]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFFC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many financial crimes in the society?

One thing I like about Bitcoin is that it was not created for politicians to do their evil deeds because they can be exposed. It's not possible for money to go missing in Nigeria just like that, there must be a source and there must be a receiver.

Let's say a politician stole ₦1b and want to use Bitcoin to move the money, it's going to be difficult because you can't send the money from one bank account which is going to be coperate or business to a random person, it will raise suspicion, banks ar  going to know.

If they plan to distribute the money into several account, they will get exposed because how many accounts are you going to use and how many sellers are you going to meet, the money can't be moved easily, you can't steal governments money and think of using to buy Bitcoin.


What this politician do to steal money is move with physical cash. They withdraw the money from the bank and accounts and hide them because it's difficult to see offline Bitcoin vendors. Instead of this stress, they go for burewa D change to launder the money to dollar Currency. Reason is that, the conversion is higher, a dollar to Naira is ₦1530, if you convert 1bn to usd, it will amount to $653k which they can hide physically.

Remember when dollars were uncovered in a secret completed building in 2017, about $43 ar currency, and some other currency, that money was hidden by one politician and the information to the where about was definitely leak by someone who knew the house was there.

https://guardian.ng/news/efcc-uncovers-another-massive-stash-of-monies-in-lagos-apartment/

[Bright0515]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFFC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

That is correct mate. I done also think about this thing before but I later find out say them fit trace suspicious transactions if anybody from the government dey use Bitcoin do money laundering. E fit dey difficult but trust me say a good developer fit trace suspicious crypto transactions if government or any body use am for money laundering. With the blockchain analysis tools, person wey dey think outside the box go fit trace am, we know say the government knows the best hackers for the country so them go fit trace am.

[xiamin]

We understand the bad uses of centralized assets when they are controlled by someone. When the value of the domestic currency starts decreasing and your standard of living starts to decline due to inflation, you will start looking for alternative financial systems. Bitcoin transactions or investments provide you with much more security than centralized assets. One of the reasons for Satoshi establishment of decentralized assets was to maintain a single dominance over assets. In centralized assets, government interference over your assets and accountability to banks are all annoying things, so decentralized systems are a great way to get rid of them.

[AVE5]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and madon't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFFC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

Bitcoin Wasn't ever created to fight financial crimes but to end the dubiousness of regulations and it authorities where individuals are deprived of their rights and conveniences of facilitating transactions and same be custodial of your funds which system can only be actualized by the concept of the decentlization.
There's no ever going to be a technology or central policies that could end financial corruption. Perhaps from the world banks down to the local sectors including other authorities are all corrupted so never expected a honesty in a regulating sector. It's either not the part of the potential of bitcoin to fight such money laundering.
I also hope you haven't been convinced by the critics that speculates that bitcoin is projected to support Crime with it decentralized potential that can also keep users identify anonymous.

[Cryptoprincess101]

Even without decentralization, politicians can still get away with loots because you need to understand that these politicians do not keep all their money in their name, some keep those funds in the account of relatives and their loyalists and even business tycoons. I don't see the decentralization of bitcoin as an avenue for government officials to hide looted funds because no matter how they try to hide it, the movement of the transactions will still be traced through the blockchain, it will only take a lot of time but they can be traced except in a scenario where those funds are not moved after they must have converted it to bitcoins. Have you heard about Abacha loot? the government is still recovering looted funds till date so no matter how long it will take, if the EFCC is determined they can be tracked.

[Mia Chloe]

I have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFCC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins.

It's not really something you have to think about because it's basically something that has been happening for a very long time and is not going to stop either anytime soon. Basically although bitcoin is based on decentralization , you can't really blame the negative uses on the network.

The whole thing is worse for privacy coins like zcash and especially Monero. The government has virtually succeeded in taking Monero off grid almost to totally and they mostly blame it on Monero being used for fraudulent practices.

[Emjay24]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFCC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

When you talk about looting of funds and financial crimes, it is possible in every financial medium and not just with bitcoin, we have heard stories of politicians looting and hiding money in swiss banks and EFCC couldn't do anything to bring such funds back. We've had cases of money launderings and so on.

FYI Bitcoin is not fully anonymous, movement of funds can still be traced with blockchain analysis unless the person employs services of a mixer or diverts the funds into fully anonymous coins like Monero.

The only valid reason government labels bitcoin for financial crimes is because it is decentralized and they cannot control it directly and not just the financial crimes because e no get means wey dem no dey take loot money.

[Churchillvv]

It has been and will always be that any form of money will be used for the wrong purpose bitcoin is not excluded, it’s not bitcoins fault that is has some level of privacy and decentralized system but the individual who uses it for the wrong purpose.

currently it might no be traceable to the politician but it’s not a point to be considered as it’s has always been stereotyped that bitcoin is used for criminal activities even before today.

Before bitcoin cash where still looted and not traceable so it’s not different with bitcoin, what will be the solution is individual change even the EFCC can’t help the country because they also are corrupt.

[Callido]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFCC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

It doesn't stress them to loot what they want, using  Bitcoin is far too stressful for them, with local fiat they can move billions of Naira untraced. Banks and EFCC will be partners to help in the looting, i don't mean to generalize the act when i say banks and EFCC, there are those who work within banks hand to hand with government and must obey authority plus the benefits they will earn.

Good or bad reviews, we must appreciate Bitcoin decentralization, stealing in Bitcoin is no different than stealing in fiat, all thief na thief.

[Samlucky O]

Bitcoin was created to stand as a decentralized medium of making transactions from one person to another without the involvement of a third party or the government which is a good initiative towards privacy and maintaining anonymity while performing transactions but i have also thought of it in the other way round, don't we think that politicians who loot government funds can use bitcoins to hide huge amount of money such that when the EFCC want to probe them for mismanagement of funds it will be difficult to recover looted funds since they might not be able to trace it due to the fact that they have converted the money to bitcoins. Can decentralization really help us at this time when there are so many cases of financial crimes in the society?

What I can tell you is that whatever that has advantage also has a disadvantage too, so that is the bad side of decentralization. But however we can not only capitalize on the disadvantages since the advantage is also important. Let's say that I want to travel abroad and I have lots of inherited property that I need to sell, and I sold it eventually, if I know that sending such huge money to the bank will result to lots of questioning I may decide to use it and buy Bitcoin and receive it in my decentralized wallet, before traveling abroad to avoid much questions from the bank. And also if I want to recieve large from from outside country directly to my account may result to much questions I may decide to receive in my crypto wallet and sell gradually. So in however way you put it, the advantage can not be neglected because of the disadvantage of money laundry.