Beware, MtGox arbitrarily freezing verified accounts

[phungus]

It must be tough running a service that everyone wants a piece of. :-)

-p

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[EhVedadoOAnonimato]

If multiples accounts access from the same IP, they can't know whether it's the same individual trying to trade more than the threshold, or if they're multiple individuals.

If multiple accounts access from different IPs, they also can't know whether it's the same individual or not. So detecting account accesses from the same IP seems kind of pointless.

Well, I guess it might be enough to say you've tried your best using all technology available. MtGox does try to ban anonymous proxies, for example. There's that casino which makes lots of effort in trying to forbid USA players, by blocking IPs of proxies too. But of course, both may eventually let something pass. Even the GFW of China has its holes.

If such restrictions are enough to get MtGox labeled as "cooperative" by IRS/FBI/whatever, then they're good.

[2112]

Paymium, I remember seeing that in my mailbox... Yep, the guys who registered a "bitcoin" trademark in France to steal the bitcoin.fr domain. Hope now they know that no, it's not "legit" to register a trademark for the purpose of taking over a domain name.

I'm just quoting the most interesting part to be able to find it faster in the future.

[davout]

Found the IRC message in the log, but could have been better by email.

Will do next time.

Anyway your account shows no trace of ever being verified.

Oh sorry then, I guess my withdraw limits magically went to those of a verified account, see previous screenshot. Or your very own DB if you don't trust me.

However when creating the new system is was not practical to manually go through all those emails and transfer the data to the secure storage.

This must be some kind of joke. When I trade on your platform I don't find it practical to pay fees, can I skip that ?
We all pay to use mtgox, in exchange we all expect some level of service, part of that would be that when you migrate a system, you migrate the data that goes with it even if it's "not practical".

Because of AML requirements, we need an utility bill or any other proof of home address (having received a yubikey is not acceptable).

Fine, I have no problem with that. Just don't lock down my account, give it unverified withdrawal limits if there are documents missing.

Also should be noted that the old MtGox system did not track users' verification status, causing all verified status to vanish when the switch was done in June 2011. Users were invited to re-verify at that time. If you didn't, then it means your account was not verified, and as such can end needing to be verified if specific conditions are met.

Again, my limits say otherwise, and I didn't get notified of anything related to having to submit additional documentation.

Paymium, I remember seeing that in my mailbox... Yep, the guys who registered a "bitcoin" trademark in France to steal the bitcoin.fr domain. Hope now they know that no, it's not "legit" to register a trademark for the purpose of taking over a domain name.

Pathetic.

[tvbcof]

Paymium, I remember seeing that in my mailbox... Yep, the guys who registered a "bitcoin" trademark in France to steal the bitcoin.fr domain. Hope now they know that no, it's not "legit" to register a trademark for the purpose of taking over a domain name.

Pathetic.

As a person who trusts more funds with you through Instawallet than is normally my nature, I have a keen interest in how you handle the various affairs that you are involved in.  I was hoping for a more detailed response on this one.

Separately, I'm sorry to see the Mt. Gox is fucking with you.  It's not crystal clear if 'not legit' is defined as something which Mt. Gox can use as an excuse to take your money or what, but I am interested on an academic level.  I had already planned on exploring alternates if/when I decide to cash out (of Bitcoin) in a significant way, but this goes some distance toward solidifying my plans.

As a vague aside, I got my issues worked out with Paypal so I'm probably going to go back to using them as usual...the memory of what they did to Wikilieaks becoming dim and easier to palate...  Paypal wanted my SSN card, proof of residence, and a photo ID.  The latter is a no-go since I don't trust them not to sell it to the highest bidder (esp, the NSA) or have if ripped by hackers..and to trust Paypal's security engineering significantly more than Mt. Gox's.  Anyway, as usual, Paypal's site would not let me do what I wanted to do so I called.  The lady took my DOB and SSN over the phone and said that everything is now cool.

[556j]

  Anyway, as usual, Paypal's site would not let me do what I wanted to do so I called.  The lady took my DOB and SSN over the phone and said that everything is now cool.

and she entered it into the same DB you refused to put in in the first place. Only difference is you now comminucated it to some $7/hour slave. Yah, you're definitely better off now  . Mtgox is cancer, paypal is slightly better but still shit. Do everything you can to p2p transfer.

[tvbcof]

  Anyway, as usual, Paypal's site would not let me do what I wanted to do so I called.  The lady took my DOB and SSN over the phone and said that everything is now cool.

and she entered it into the same DB you refused to put in in the first place. Only difference is you now comminucated it to some $7/hour slave. Yah, you're definitely better off now  . Mtgox is cancer, paypal is slightly better but still shit. Do everything you can to p2p transfer.

Good advice on the preference for p2p.  Person-2-Persons is what I prefer when it can be arranged, and that's probably the way I'll try to liquidate much of my Bitcoin, again if/when I choose to do so.

The photo-ID thing is pretty weird and I don't like it.  Next it will be DNA samples I suspect.  That the US state department was instructing their personal to obtain DNA samples of foreign dignitaries is actually pretty interesting.  A risky move which I suspect would not be undertaken without significant expectation of a specific use for the data.

  http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/11/u-s-chases-foreign-leaders-dna-wikileaks-shows/

But back to Paypal, in spite of their spiel about the government is requiring blah, blah, blah, in the end they let me pass by speaking 13 numbers into a phone.  So it seems to me that Paypal, at least, is going above and beyond the minimum requirements on the part of the US government.  The extra data they are collecting must be of some value I guess, or maybe they are just being proactive.  One wonders exactly what the minimum requirements Mt. Gox needs to meet are and if they are gathering extra data as a target of opportunity.

[EhVedadoOAnonimato]

Paymium, I remember seeing that in my mailbox... Yep, the guys who registered a "bitcoin" trademark in France to steal the bitcoin.fr domain. Hope now they know that no, it's not "legit" to register a trademark for the purpose of taking over a domain name.

Pathetic.

I had missed this.
Is this serious, davout? You people from Paymium tried to take over the bitcoin.fr domain by registering a trademark?

[davout]

I had missed this.

That's normal MT edited his post afterwards to add this, maybe because he felt like somehow diverting the thread from the actual issue at hand was necessary.

Is this serious, davout? You people from Paymium tried to take over the bitcoin.fr domain by registering a trademark?

Right now bitcoin.fr hosts an ad-ridden crappy blog with the last post being months old, see for yourself.
We felt that the French public deserved a better introduction to Bitcoin than a placeholder site waiting for the domain value to go up.

And so yes, we wanted bitcoin.fr to redirect to a french version of bitcoin.org.

The full e-mail exchange is here, judge for yourself.

A couple of highlights :

We are an AFNIC registrar and have access to procedures to reclaim domains (we already did it in the past without any issue).

We will make our bitcoin trademark available to anyone while trying to prevent such situation. [...]  bitcoin.fr in my opinion should redirect to some french version of bitcoin.org

Either way this is way off-topic, if there are any questions about this please make another thread, I'll happily comment there.

We take full responsibility and stand by our actions. It would be nice to see a bit less mudslinging and a bit more responsibility from a commercial company handling my passport scans. (Read: acknowledge a sub-optimal data migration and unfreeze my account after digging in the AML archive for thirty seconds, if necessary reduce the withdrawal limits to those of an unverified account).

[JoelKatz]

• Because of AML requirements, we need an utility bill or any other proof of home address (having received a yubikey is not acceptable).

Not that I don't believe you, but is there any evidence or proof you can provide of this claim? I suspect, and I think a lot of other people suspect this too, that it's actually an anti-fraud requirement and not an AML requirement. And the difference is very significant.

[paraipan]

Strange things happening at mtgox lately. My account is verified with different withdrawal limits

http://imgur.com/a/FhfF9

[thebaron]

Strange things happening at mtgox lately. My account is verified with different withdrawal limits

http://imgur.com/a/FhfF9

I don't think they tell you this, but you have to e-mail them for a limit increase - specifying what you want your limits to be.

[paraipan]

Strange things happening at mtgox lately. My account is verified with different withdrawal limits

http://imgur.com/a/FhfF9

I don't think they tell you this, but you have to e-mail them for a limit increase - specifying what you want your limits to be.

Ok, got it

[sadpandatech]

I'm required to get "verified" (even though they do have a scan of my passport and they do have a proof of address in the form of a Yubikey sent to my home)

Having something sent mailed to an address is not = 'proof of residence'. That requires a bill or other such 'official' material mailed to that address with your name on it.

I know the whole thing sucks, but it is what it is. Your interpretation of the rules does not change them unfortunately.

[tvbcof]

I'm required to get "verified" (even though they do have a scan of my passport and they do have a proof of address in the form of a Yubikey sent to my home)

Having something sent mailed ot an address is not = 'proof of residence'. That requires a bill or other such 'official' material mailed to that address with your name on it.

I know the whole thing sucks, but it is what it is. Your interpretation of the rules does not change them unfortunately.

Certain of us are looking forward to an official description of the rules so as to lend strength to various interpretations, and understand more precisely which requirements are likely mandatory to solve what problems, and which seem to be more along the lines of general information harvesting from a user-base who's balls are in an opportune orientation for squeezing.

Of course Mt. Gox (or any other service provider) does not have any requirement to be open with this information and/or their interpretation of it.  But, OTOH, customers are under no obligation to be customers...or customers fitting into a particular service category...either.  As I mentioned earlier, simply attempting to stop being a customer of Paypal brought the requirements down from 'onerous and extensive' to 'trivial'.

EDIT: addition:  I might add that Paypal allowed me to withdraw all of my funds to my linked bank account.  I simply could not add money until our issues were worked out.  I thought this fair as it allowed me to remain whole financially without divulging information which I preferred reamin secure (to my standards.)  Whether I would have had to provide the scanned photo-ID before terminating my zero-balance account I don't know since we didn't get that far.  Locking all of the funds would have been an entirely different matter.  I would consider it theft and would have taken whatever action I thought appropriate.  I don't know what pressures Tradehill was experiencing near the end, but I do know that they mailed me a check for the balance in my account (around $1500 iirc) without any requirement on my part to provide additional information over and above what I had needed when I built the balance in the first place (which I did exclusively through wire transfers.)

[bigasic]

In order for me to get verified, I had to send in my photo id and a utility bill. This was after I already had the yubikey...

Sounds like all you have to do is send in the dox that they want and everything will be fine. Just sucks that this happened right at the time you needed to cash money out.. That happened to me when I had to get authenticated, I was mad too..

[tvbcof]

In order for me to get verified, I had to send in my photo id and a utility bill. This was after I already had the yubikey...

Sounds like all you have to do is send in the dox that they want and everything will be fine. Just sucks that this happened right at the time you needed to cash money out.. That happened to me when I had to get authenticated, I was mad too..

For all the carrying on about how convenient Bitcoin is and how illiquid gold is, I was able to use Krugerrands to solve a cash flow issue with a little planning and part of a day of visiting a couple of institutions.  I also did not need to provide someone who individually and as a group has a severely hampered record of data security with all of the info a hacker could dream of wanting in order to steal my identity.  I think I let my coin dealer transcribe some info from my DL was all it took.

I'm hanging onto my BTC until such a day as it is commonplace to do Bitcoin transactions face to face, though they are useful today for charitable giving and for purchasing certain services.  The exchanges are for buying BTC...until such time as they require more info than I want to entrust with them for doing so.

[Ghostofkobra]

Mtgox, is not to be trusted, my account got emptied by "someone".

MtGox logs says that noone was logged in at the time of the Withdrawal (their logs).


https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=89142.0

The only answer i get is "we only talk to the police".


If noone logged on, they got hacked or stole my cash.

I shouldnt be blamed if my usename/pass wasnt used.

[paulie_w]

tux,

just out of curiosity, do you have any actual, legal responsibility to tax authorities outside of japan?

[intel-core-i7]

see here for another example of the same shit :


[Mtgox sux - chat logs pasted] - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=109391.0