LibertyReserve mass account blocking

[lucif]

I didn't find the discussion of this, so there it is.

People reported here, here and in twitter that there was mass account blocking incident from LR side.

Also I noticed that AurumXchange terminated LR operations.

This is the not 1st accident with LR. And many people trade bitcoins for LR. I think that was another reason why the bitcoin price went so deep down.

Personally, my LR account is fine. What about yours?

[paraipan]

I didn't find the discussion of this, so there it is.

People reported here, here and in twitter that there was mass account blocking incident from LR side.

Also I noticed that AurumXchange terminated LR operations.

This is the not 1st accident with LR. And many people trade bitcoins for LR. I think that was another reason why the bitcoin price went so deep down.

Personally, my LR account is fine. What about yours?

Account is ok here, but didn't had much activity lately. Could be troubles on LR's part and they don't want to publish anything.

Something is up, look at Wm-center having a 0% LR sale https://www.wm-center.com/news.html#133 LOL

[dust]

I've never seen so many ads for ponzi scams on one page.

[lucif]

http://blog.aurumxchange.com/2012/08/liberty-reserve-not-available.html

Due to some ongoing issues with Liberty Reserve, we have currently suspended operations with said e-currency. We hope for this situation to be resolved next week. At this time we do not have any estimates on when operations will be resumed.

We apologize for the inconvenience and would like to remind our customers that all other exchange directions are operating normally. Please note that we do not have any further information regarding this issue at this time. Please do not contact support regarding this matter until we can gather more information ourselves.

[TheKoziTwo]

I sense the history of e-gold repeating. Perhaps there has been a government raid or demands recently imposed upon liberty reserve? I see no other reason for them to suddenly start blocking accounts, going overdue in maintenance mode, acting unreliable and basically ruining their own business? Will be interesting to see this unfold, I am afraid we might see the death of LR. There is lots of business going on in LR that will need to find a new home. Shame to lose another good payment processor, but hey, maybe bitcoin can take its place?

[Stephen Gornick]

Personally, my LR account is fine.

And the site reports:

System is offline for maintenance

Liberty Reseve service is undergoing scheduled maintenance.

Please try to visit again in a couple of hours.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

 - http://www.LibertyReserve.com


The are now 9 hours past the end of the "scheduled maintenance" window:

 - http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/08/scheduled-maintenance-august-20-1100am.html

[Littleshop]

Personally, my LR account is fine.

And the site reports:

System is offline for maintenance

Liberty Reseve service is undergoing scheduled maintenance.

Please try to visit again in a couple of hours.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

 - http://www.LibertyReserve.com


The are now 9 hours past the end of the "scheduled maintenance" window:

 - http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/08/scheduled-maintenance-august-20-1100am.html

The blog now lists downtime until the 22'nd.   Could you imagine the uproar if paypal was down that long?

[bitcoinBull]

I sense the history of e-gold repeating. Perhaps there has been a government raid or demands recently imposed upon liberty reserve? I see no other reason for them to suddenly start blocking accounts, going overdue in maintenance mode, acting unreliable and basically ruining their own business? Will be interesting to see this unfold, I am afraid we might see the death of LR. There is lots of business going on in LR that will need to find a new home. Shame to lose another good payment processor, but hey, maybe bitcoin can take its place?

It wouldn't surprise me if we just saw the last breath of LR. There was always the suspicion that it was a fractional operation. That the operators doubled as exchangers able to give themselves unlimited LR dollars, which they sold for Western Union payments or whatever. Such a scheme would collapse if the net-flow turned negative (like a ponzi).

The timing here is very suspicious, coming right after a peak in BTC price. That suggests other e-currencies were chasing BTC, a run which may have broken the LR bank.

[Littleshop]

I sense the history of e-gold repeating. Perhaps there has been a government raid or demands recently imposed upon liberty reserve? I see no other reason for them to suddenly start blocking accounts, going overdue in maintenance mode, acting unreliable and basically ruining their own business? Will be interesting to see this unfold, I am afraid we might see the death of LR. There is lots of business going on in LR that will need to find a new home. Shame to lose another good payment processor, but hey, maybe bitcoin can take its place?

It wouldn't surprise me if we just saw the last breath of LR. There was always the suspicion that it was a fractional operation. That the operators doubled as exchangers able to give themselves unlimited LR dollars, which they sold for Western Union payments or whatever. Such a scheme would collapse if the net-flow turned negative (like a ponzi).

The timing here is very suspicious, coming right after a peak in BTC price. That suggests other e-currencies were chasing BTC, a run which may have broken the LR bank.

Hard to say.  LR charged enough fees to warrant them continuing operation vs trying to steal the money.  Why would you steal all the money and risk jail etc when all you would have to do is wait 100 days for the same amount to come in fees. 

Something else is going on.... a hack..... government intervention..... who knows??

[VelvetLeaf]

I would suggest you to withdraw all your funds there once the "maintenance" is complete, 2 days "maintenance" isn't normal.

It is possible that :

1. "Someone" exchanged significant amount of Bitcoins to LR $ in various "mini" LR account after the "operation" is successful
2. Liberty Reserve doesn't have enough massive "reserve" to cover that up
3. Liberty Reserve goes into "maintenance" mode for 2 days until this pirate incident is clear

Note :
LR is hacker's preferred payout choice during bitcoinica and other bitcoin "hack".
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=95738.0

Current maintenance

2 days
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable: From August 20 until August 22,
This upgrade will give you a faster, more productive system.
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/08/scheduled-maintenance-august-20-1100am.html

Previous maintenance :

2 hours
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: August 11, between 06:00 (am) and 8:00 (am)(UTC)
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/08/scheduled-maintenance-august-11-0600am.html

2 hours
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: May 19, between 06:00 (am) and 8:00 (am)(UTC)
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/05/scheduled-maintenance-may-19-0600am-utc.html

N/A
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/04/scheduled-maintenance-june-18-0800-am.html

1 hour
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 12 March, between 08:00 (am) and 9:00 (am)(UTC)
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/03/scheduled-maintenance-12-march-0800am.html

1 hour
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 28 January, between 08:00am and 9:00am UTC
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/01/scheduled-maintenance-28-january-0800am.html

1 hour
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 26 January, between 10:00am and 11:00am UTC
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/01/scheduled-maintenance-26-january-1000am.html

2 hours
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 21 January, between 08:00am and 10:00am UTC
This upgrade will give you a faster and more productive system.
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/01/scheduled-maintenance-21-january-0800am.html

3 hours
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 05 November, between 07:00 (am) and 10:00 (am)(UTC)
This upgrade will give you a faster, more productive system.
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2011/03/scheduled-maintenance-10-march-1650-gmt.html

2 hours
Liberty Reserve will be unavailable on: 24 July, between 8:00 and 10:00(GMT)
This upgrade will give you a faster, more productive system.
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2009/11/scheduled-maintenance-15-november-1200.html

[bitcoinBull]

Hard to say.  LR charged enough fees to warrant them continuing operation vs trying to steal the money.  Why would you steal all the money and risk jail etc when all you would have to do is wait 100 days for the same amount to come in fees. 

Something else is going on.... a hack..... government intervention..... who knows??

I think you're overestimating their income on fees. Its not a trading platform like MtGox, so they don't have the same large transaction volume which generates big income from fees. If they took by fractional accounting more than they've earned on fees, they wouldn't turn around and give back those "profits" when the net-flow turned negative. Especially when it was a shady offshore corporation from the get-go, by a couple of russians probably already sitting safe in Russia from Costa Rican law enforcement.

They've had downtime for maintenance before. But I don't believe users have seen reports before of big accounts of $10ks-$100ks being locked down. At this point, the scare is in place and the run will be self-sulfilling if they come back online. Thinking about it, I'd be very surprised to see them come back online and unlock those big accounts.

[lucif]

On hyip forums people say LR had a downtime of two weeks in a year ago or so.

[benjamindees]

The timing here is very suspicious, coming right after a peak in BTC price. That suggests other e-currencies were chasing BTC, a run which may have broken the LR bank.

That is interesting.

[VelvetLeaf]

Additional 2-4 days "maintenance"
http://blog.libertyreserve.com/2012/08/maintenance-update_22.html

Front page looks "normal"
http://www.libertyreserve.com/

but if you go to the real login page, you'll see the maintenance page.
https://www.libertyreserve.com/en/login

For me, it looks like an attempt to cover something up.

Dear friends, it has come to our attention that some of our customers became concerned with our latest maintenance continuation and erroneous account status change for a group of our clients. Please find below an official explanation of reasons behind both instances:

1. There is a group of blocked accounts which were erroneously blocked by an automated script that was tested in the beginning of August and apparently has failed to perform properly. Script was designed to automatically secure in account in the event of multiple suspicious login attempts. During this maintenance we have identified the problem, addressed it and it is now being solved.

2. Since we were forced to perform extended maintenance, we saw an opportunity to add some of the additional features that were pending to be added to the website. As the web site appears shortly, you will discover Credit Card Funding option (available ONLY to a verified users), along with other minor improvements and enhancements.

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this maintenance may have brought to you and would like to assure you that both issues are addressed in a timely manner and currently being worked on around the clock for the quickest and safest resolution. During this final stage of maintenance we are identifying erroneously blocked accounts and updating their statuses to "normal". This is a long and tedious process so your patience is appreciated. While we are doing everything possible to bring the system back faster, these processes make take an additional up to 2-4 days to complete.

Any other explanation of this maintenance that you may come across online in various online forums is inaccurate or simply put - false and misleading.

[Stephen Gornick]

As the web site appears shortly, you will discover Credit Card Funding option (available ONLY to a verified users),

Whooah!!!!

[paraipan]

As the web site appears shortly, you will discover Credit Card Funding option (available ONLY to a verified users),

Whooah!!!!

 

[Stephen Gornick]

Still down ... Firday Aug 24, 22:00 UTC

Here's another thread on the topic:

 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=102992.0

[Littleshop]

Now back up. 

[VelvetLeaf]

Now back up. 

Nope, try going to https://www.libertyreserve.com/en/login

[Globes]

still down