BFL subpoena

[sbogovac]

To prevent this sort of thing happening in future why doesn't theymos cede control of the forum to someone he trusts who lives in Russia or Belize or wherever, and who is willing to ignore such subpoenas?

Why? It's not the responsibility of theymos to make sure the users of this forum are decent honest people. It's also not his responsibility to protect forum users from the law. He's a forum administrator not a mommy or a nanny. He only has one job duty on this forum and only owes one thing to its membership - keep the forum running. There are a bunch of little jobs inside that one duty like keep the spam down, ban the disruptive people, pay for the hosting, update the software, bla bla. Nowhere in that duty list does it say, keep members from being ripped off and hide them from the law.

It does however "say": provide information to people who request it formally and with good reason... If Theymos had seen this as 'no good reason' (which in part he did) he's free to protest (which he did succesfully)...

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[IPO Magic]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. The fact that such practices may be perfectly legal in Liberland is irrelevant. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

But, again, we're not talking about logic, we're talking about US law.

[Quickseller]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

The forum has instituted a policy to generally not look into the various deals that people are considering to make. As a result it does not know if something is a scam or not. A similar thing can be said about unregistered securities as the forum does not verify that something that could be considered to be a security is properly registered.

The only real way that CL can *know* that a specific person is using CL to find victims to kill is if the killer is actually convicted (and would most likely in be jail), otherwise it would just be speculation

[IPO Magic]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

The forum has instituted a policy to generally not look into the various deals that people are considering to make. As a result it does not know if something is a scam or not. A similar thing can be said about unregistered securities as the forum does not verify that something that could be considered to be a security is properly registered.

Such policy is simply illegal in US. As I already have pointed out, "If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed." That's what is being discussed - users alerting Theymos of a crime taking place, and Theymos refusing to act because policy.

[Quickseller]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

The forum has instituted a policy to generally not look into the various deals that people are considering to make. As a result it does not know if something is a scam or not. A similar thing can be said about unregistered securities as the forum does not verify that something that could be considered to be a security is properly registered.

Such policy is simply illegal in US. As I already have pointed out, "If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed." That's what is being discussed - users alerting Theymos of a crime taking place, and Theymos refusing to act because policy.

Why don't you cite the law that makes this policy illegal? Section 230 of the Communications Decency act protects the owners of a website who publish information provided by others.

There have been a number of court cases involving ponzis on the forum and theymos (or the forum) were not held liable

[IPO Magic]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

The forum has instituted a policy to generally not look into the various deals that people are considering to make. As a result it does not know if something is a scam or not. A similar thing can be said about unregistered securities as the forum does not verify that something that could be considered to be a security is properly registered.

Such policy is simply illegal in US. As I already have pointed out, "If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed." That's what is being discussed - users alerting Theymos of a crime taking place, and Theymos refusing to act because policy.

Why don't you cite the law that makes this policy illegal? Section 230 of the Communications Decency act protects the owners of a website who publish information provided by others.

There have been a number of court cases involving ponzis on the forum and theymos (or the forum) were not held liable

Not sure if you're intentionally missing the point. The case law cited in your wiki article does not address knowingly facilitating illegal activities.
In other words, a website allowing users to post pictures & being 95% child porn is not going to benefit from Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Regardless of disclaimers.

Re. bitcointalk lawsuits: not you're referring to (links?), but the fact that theymos has not been charged with anything merely proves that bitcointalk is much more useful as a honypot, a place that a couple of fat LEO could monitor from the comfort of their office.
And providing a perfect paper trail to second-rate conmen, should their scams warrant sufficient interest.
As long as theymos cooperates, everything's fine. Thus far, he's been cooperative

[QuestionAuthority]

To prevent this sort of thing happening in future why doesn't theymos cede control of the forum to someone he trusts who lives in Russia or Belize or wherever, and who is willing to ignore such subpoenas?

Why? It's not the responsibility of theymos to make sure the users of this forum are decent honest people. It's also not his responsibility to protect forum users from the law. He's a forum administrator not a mommy or a nanny. He only has one job duty on this forum and only owes one thing to its membership - keep the forum running. There are a bunch of little jobs inside that one duty like keep the spam down, ban the disruptive people, pay for the hosting, update the software, bla bla. Nowhere in that duty list does it say, keep members from being ripped off and hide them from the law.

It does however "say": provide information to people who request it formally and with good reason... If Theymos had seen this as 'no good reason' (which in part he did) he's free to protest (which he did succesfully)...

He didn't have to protest, he did that because he's a bleeding heart liberal. If I was running this forum and received a subpoena I'd roll you over in the clover every single time. Mainly because I don't have a reason to make your criminal behavior become my legal battle.

[Quickseller]

Why don't you cite the law that makes this policy illegal? Section 230 of the Communications Decency act protects the owners of a website who publish information provided by others.

There have been a number of court cases involving ponzis on the forum and theymos (or the forum) were not held liable

Not sure if you're intentionally missing the point. The case law cited in your wiki article does not address knowingly facilitating illegal activities.
In other words, a website allowing users to post pictures & being 95% child porn is not going to benefit from Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Regardless of disclaimers.

Like I said in the past, the forum does not attempt to investigate if something is a scam or not therefore they do not have knowledge of illegal activity if there is any. Just because someone claims that something is illegal does not make it so. I ask again that you cite a law saying that the forum is breaking the law by not moderating scams.

Re. bitcointalk lawsuits: not you're referring to (links?), but the fact that theymos has not been charged with anything merely proves that bitcointalk is much more useful as a honypot, a place that a couple of fat LEO could monitor from the comfort of their office.
And providing a perfect paper trail to second-rate conmen, should their scams warrant sufficient interest.
As long as theymos cooperates, everything's fine. Thus far, he's been cooperative

I don't see your point here. So what if the forum is a de-facto honeypot? Don't break the law?

edit: link to case regarding illegal activity on the forum

[IPO Magic]

Why don't you cite the law that makes this policy illegal? Section 230 of the Communications Decency act protects the owners of a website who publish information provided by others.

There have been a number of court cases involving ponzis on the forum and theymos (or the forum) were not held liable

Not sure if you're intentionally missing the point. The case law cited in your wiki article does not address knowingly facilitating illegal activities.
In other words, a website allowing users to post pictures & being 95% child porn is not going to benefit from Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Regardless of disclaimers.

Like I said in the past, the forum does not attempt to investigate if something is a scam or not therefore they do not have knowledge of illegal activity if there is any. Just because someone claims that something is illegal does not make it so. I ask again that you cite a law saying that the forum is breaking the law by not moderating scams.

Oh, let me see... Let's start with the gambling section.
There's the Interstate Wire Act, that goes something like this:

Whoever being engaged in the business of betting or wagering knowingly uses a wire communication facility for the transmission in interstate or foreign commerce of bets or wagers or information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers on any sporting event or contest, or for the transmission of a wire communication which entitles the recipient to receive money or credit as a result of bets or wagers, or for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.

there's also Internet Gambling Regulation, Consumer Protection, and Enforcement Act, a plethora more.
Plenty of things this forum can go down for, a veritable grab bag.
Still wanna to go there?

Re. bitcointalk lawsuits: not you're referring to (links?), but the fact that theymos has not been charged with anything merely proves that bitcointalk is much more useful as a honypot, a place that a couple of fat LEO could monitor from the comfort of their office.
And providing a perfect paper trail to second-rate conmen, should their scams warrant sufficient interest.
As long as theymos cooperates, everything's fine. Thus far, he's been cooperative

I don't see your point here. So what if the forum is a de-facto honeypot? Don't break the law?

edit: link to case regarding illegal activity on the forum

Bitcointalk was not on the wrong side of the letter v. In the case you cited, it was Mr. Shavers.

I've pointed out that a street dealer being allowed to run around on the loose does not imply that dealing dope is legal.
It only implies that (a) he hasn't been popped yet, or (b) he's more useful to LEO as a snitch.
That's all.

[Quickseller]

Does bitcointalk run some kind of casino? Does it engage in the business of betting? If not then your cited Interstate Wire Act does not show that the forum is breaking the law.

Wasn't pirate40 running a ponzi scheme on the forum? I know that there were threads about his ponzi on here. If you are saying that by not taking down scams the forum knows about they are breaking the law, and it should have been obvious that he was running a ponzi that would eventually collapse (e.g. a scam).

[sbogovac]

To prevent this sort of thing happening in future why doesn't theymos cede control of the forum to someone he trusts who lives in Russia or Belize or wherever, and who is willing to ignore such subpoenas?

Why? It's not the responsibility of theymos to make sure the users of this forum are decent honest people. It's also not his responsibility to protect forum users from the law. He's a forum administrator not a mommy or a nanny. He only has one job duty on this forum and only owes one thing to its membership - keep the forum running. There are a bunch of little jobs inside that one duty like keep the spam down, ban the disruptive people, pay for the hosting, update the software, bla bla. Nowhere in that duty list does it say, keep members from being ripped off and hide them from the law.

It does however "say": provide information to people who request it formally and with good reason... If Theymos had seen this as 'no good reason' (which in part he did) he's free to protest (which he did succesfully)...

He didn't have to protest, he did that because he's a bleeding heart liberal. If I was running this forum and received a subpoena I'd roll you over in the clover every single time. Mainly because I don't have a reason to make your criminal behavior become my legal battle.

I'm "a bleeding heart liberal" too, but basically we seem to agree... 

[IPO Magic]

Does bitcointalk run some kind of casino? Does it engage in the business of betting? If not then your cited Interstate Wire Act does not show that the forum is breaking the law.

Wasn't pirate40 running a ponzi scheme on the forum? I know that there were threads about his ponzi on here. If you are saying that by not taking down scams the forum knows about they are breaking the law, and it should have been obvious that he was running a ponzi that would eventually collapse (e.g. a scam).

Bitcointalk engages in "transmission of a wire communication [...] for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers."
Again, the fact that Theymos was not V& for pirate's f*ckup doesn't mean he is above reproach & should keep pushing the envelope. Most who break laws aren't charged. Until they are.

Before this degenerates into more internet lawyering & wiki quotin', let me point out that what you're doing now is absurd at best. You might think yourself a white knight, but in reality you're more like my clueless buddy, who started lecturing a statey when we got pulled over. From my passenger seat.
Had the cop gotten irked and as much as frisked me, it wouldn't have been his ass in the back of that cop car.

You may now return to... what is it that you do? Sell Bitcointalk accounts?

[Quickseller]

Does bitcointalk run some kind of casino? Does it engage in the business of betting? If not then your cited Interstate Wire Act does not show that the forum is breaking the law.

Wasn't pirate40 running a ponzi scheme on the forum? I know that there were threads about his ponzi on here. If you are saying that by not taking down scams the forum knows about they are breaking the law, and it should have been obvious that he was running a ponzi that would eventually collapse (e.g. a scam).

Bitcointalk engages in "transmission of a wire communication [...] for information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers."
Again, the fact that Theymos was not V& for pirate's f*ckup doesn't mean he is above reproach & should keep pushing the envelope. Most who break laws aren't charged. Until they are.

Before this degenerates into more internet lawyering & wiki quotin', let me point out that what you're doing now is absurd at best. You might think yourself a white knight, but in reality you're more like my clueless buddy, who started lecturing a statey when we got pulled over. From my passenger seat.
Had the cop gotten irked and as much as frisked me, it wouldn't have been his ass in the back of that cop car.

You may now return to... what is it that you do? Sell Bitcointalk accounts?

It looks like you did not cite the entire law. According to cornell university, other relevant sections of the Interstate Wire Act are:

(b) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prevent the transmission in interstate or foreign commerce of information for use in news reporting of sporting events or contests, or for the transmission of information assisting in the placing of bets or wagers on a sporting event or contest from a State or foreign country where betting on that sporting event or contest is legal into a State or foreign country in which such betting is legal.

-snip-

(d) When any common carrier, subject to the jurisdiction of the Federal Communications Commission, is notified in writing by a Federal, State, or local law enforcement agency, acting within its jurisdiction, that any facility furnished by it is being used or will be used for the purpose of transmitting or receiving gambling information in interstate or foreign commerce in violation of Federal, State or local law, it shall discontinue or refuse, the leasing, furnishing, or maintaining of such facility, after reasonable notice to the subscriber, but no damages, penalty or forfeiture, civil or criminal, shall be found against any common carrier for any act done in compliance with any notice received from a law enforcement agency. Nothing in this section shall be deemed to prejudice the right of any person affected thereby to secure an appropriate determination, as otherwise provided by law, in a Federal court or in a State or local tribunal or agency, that such facility should not be discontinued or removed, or should be restored.

-snip-

First, in order to violate section (b), it would need to be proven that the forum is not reporting the news in relation to any bets that you think it is facilitating; I think that is a pretty high burden. Section (b) also has an exemption that states that it is okay to transmit information when the actual betting is being done in a place where it is legal to place such bets.

Do you have any evidence that such bets are being placed from/to places where it is illegal to gamble? If not then the law you cite is not being broken.

You may now return to... what is it that you do? Sell Bitcointalk accounts?

I am not sure why so many people think that I sell bitcointalk accounts. You clearly are not playing very close attention to detail

[IPO Magic]

...
Before this degenerates into more internet lawyering & wiki quotin' ...

Clearly, I was too late

So you're not selling bitcointalk accounts? Nor have sold accounts in the past?
Huh, must've mistaken you with some other pillar of bitcointalk community. What do you do now, sell trust?
(your link doesn't work for me, not sure why)

Edit: Never mind, it was a truncated link, fixed it and looooooo! You do sell accounts, a whole thread of eking out a living by peddling them. What made you stop? Out of stock? Or did you stack enough cheddar?

[r3wt]

He didn't have to protest, he did that because he's a bleeding heart liberal. If I was running this forum and received a subpoena I'd roll you over in the clover every single time. Mainly because I don't have a reason to make your criminal behavior become my legal battle.

/thread

[smoothie]

The term "Private Message" isn't as private as you might think.

We should start calling it Public Message with a twist of "maybe" privacy if no legal authority asks for it.

[Quickseller]

The term "Private Message" isn't as private as you might think.

We should start calling it Public Message with a twist of "maybe" privacy if no legal authority asks for it.

The term "PM" is actually "Personal Message". If you want something to be private then you should PGP encrypt it to the recipient.

[Gleb Gamow]

I just found this: http://www.plainsite.org/dockets/download.html?id=176216470&z=77fe495b

And this http://ia801803.us.archive.org/33/items/gov.uscourts.ksd.97083/gov.uscourts.ksd.97083.68.1.pdf

We have been following this for months. Where have you been dude? Look at the other BFL threads.

Its hard to when only 1/60 posts is actually about the case, which is CK's point. While there may be some useful content in that old thread, there's so much noise that its untenable to actually find that information in the thread.

Dogie of course you have to say that. Is not as though you contributed anything to the thread. Complaining is easier.

Why do I have to say that? Of course I didn't contribute to that thread, it was unusable and a mess. Not a lot of point investing time into thoughtful discussion there when its going to get buried by PG/GG within 20 seconds.

Odd, for it was PG/GG, me, Bruno Kucinskas, that contributed immensely to the investigation against BFL, conducting more research than most, with more discoveries than all the others combined not part of the "most" part. Recall, I'm the one that shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that BFL used BitPay as their own personal exchange to launder tens of millions of dollars worth of bitcoins via BFL's 1QAHVyRzkmD4j1pU5W89htZ3c6D6E7iWDs bitcoin wallet address to fiat, directed toward bank accounts currently unknown, albeit BitPay has the records.


"Bruno is making our new thread unusable and a mess. Meanwhile, you're more than welcome to use our Star System Rating Service, derived via our bespoke Much Wow Algorithm. Apologies for the echo."

[Leeroy Jenkins]

+1 for Bruno. Bitcointalk's #1 detective and PI.

[Gleb Gamow]

A disclaimer stating that scams are not banned doesn't absolve the forum from responsibility of being a vehicle for fraud.

By that same logic, if your Bitcoin node relayed a fraudulent transaction it received it would be a vehicle for fraud, therefore it's safe to assume every Bitcoin user running a node is just as guilty as theymos as undoubtedly every Bitcoin node has relayed a fraudulent transaction.

We're not discussing logic or how things should be, had we our way. We're talking about US laws. US laws do not allow US person to run websites where people sell CI drugs, or promoting unregistered securities. This is basic stuff.

Thankfully the law doesn't work that way and there are laws in place designed to protect website owners from the actions of their users, which is why craigslist's owners aren't in jail for the actions of people like the Craigslist Killer.

If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed.

Further, if most of the ads on Craigslist were made by killers, putting a disclaimer along the lines of...

or, rather, "We do not remove ads by likely killers. Thus far, it appears that roughly 95% of these ads have proven to have been placed by confirmed murderers. Use your head." just wouldn't cut the mustard

The forum has instituted a policy to generally not look into the various deals that people are considering to make. As a result it does not know if something is a scam or not. A similar thing can be said about unregistered securities as the forum does not verify that something that could be considered to be a security is properly registered.

Such policy is simply illegal in US. As I already have pointed out, "If Craigslist operators knew the ad was placed by a murderer, were informed, on multiple occasions, that the guy was killing people, and refused to take down the ad? You can be absolutely certain they'd be jailed." That's what is being discussed - users alerting Theymos of a crime taking place, and Theymos refusing to act because policy.

Why don't you cite the law that makes this policy illegal? Section 230 of the Communications Decency act protects the owners of a website who publish information provided by others.

There have been a number of court cases involving ponzis on the forum and theymos (or the forum) were not held liable

Not sure if you're intentionally missing the point. The case law cited in your wiki article does not address knowingly facilitating illegal activities.
In other words, a website allowing users to post pictures & being 95% child porn is not going to benefit from Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act. Regardless of disclaimers.

Re. bitcointalk lawsuits: not you're referring to (links?), but the fact that theymos has not been charged with anything merely proves that bitcointalk is much more useful as a honypot, a place that a couple of fat LEO could monitor from the comfort of their office.
And providing a perfect paper trail to second-rate conmen, should their scams warrant sufficient interest.
As long as theymos cooperates, everything's fine. Thus far, he's been cooperative

Damn, I wanna comment on this post so badly, but my tongue is bleeding.