Debate: Do you think criminals do more good than harm to bitcoin?

[brunoshady]

Lately I have seen another news of some kidnappers demanding ransom in bitcoin. Then the family seems to be really bought $1.7M worth of BTC (about 5.5k BTC as my estimate). This would be one of the reason for the recent price increase ($1.7M is a lot of money!). However medias keep spreading false information on bitcoin, like stating 'bitcoin is using widely in criminals' etc.

So how do you think? Does the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?

[dothebeats]

It is still bad for me, because it imprints a negative impression on the minds of people who read this kind of news about bitcoin. You can say that it has a good effect price-wise but overall, it' creates uncertainty on the side of the masses on whether or not they would use bitcoin.

[1Referee]

5.5K BTC is quite a large amount, but not enough to move the market this much. And that's considering they really bought 5.5K BTC. The current price advance looks more like a rally rather than 1 entity buying coins just to be able to pay the ransom. At the end it will only be negative as the coins most likely will get mixed first and then dumped.

[Amph]

the market rised by 1B practically(33%) 1.7M is nothing in comaprison, a tiny drop in the ocean

if who want thos ebitcoin don't dump the next day, then it could be good in a bad way to ahve those situation

[Mickeyb]

I just made this post in another thread so that I don't repeat myself. There is really nothing we can do about criminals using it!!

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1229002.msg12818949#msg12818949

About 5.5k bitcoins making an impact, as others have said, this is nothing. This is one serious buy or sell and can't do nothing to the Bitcoin market.

[NorrisK]

Also, that is assuming that they are buying the coins on an exchange.

You can expect that at least part of this number of coins would be traded off exchange. First to maintain a stable but price, second because you don't want to send 2 million USD to a dubious exchange..

[RustyNomad]

I think that most of the negativity comes due to the fact that bitcoin is in the news so often so more and more people are starting to hear about it. So anything 'bitcoin' is newsworthy at this stage even more so if it involves a crime of some kind.

There are thousands of other crimes being committed daily where fiat is involved but these are not as 'newsworthy' so not really covered in the media unless there is one or other angle to the story.

So best we can hope for is that bitcoin becomes so prevalent that it's seen as just 'another currency' but I doubt whether that will happen anytime soon.

[Raimonn]

I think that criminals are bad for bitcoins. In this case they can help to the incrising prices, but could be that in just one day they sold all to convert to its local money. The bad publicity that this have its important for new users that want to join to bitcoin payment system.

[SerenaL]

I think that they help bring more trade volume to the market. If they commit crimes and get caught then that is their own fault.

[anthonycamp]

obiusly the kid could have died this its terror crime and terrible for the btc world like the money work money any kind should be used for good porpouses like work and get paid nthing more and to eat too.

[SFR10]

The image of bitcoin that has been caused by these criminals are not good at all and its not the first time that has happened... by the time im posting this , some of the members of my family think using bitcoin is illegal and I could get in trouble due to a movie they watched before which was some highschool guys selling illegal drugs at school and using bitcoin as payment so the harm is already there since people judge the entire use by seeing a single case online

[medUSA]

However medias keep spreading false information on bitcoin, like stating 'bitcoin is using widely in criminals' etc.
So how do you think? Does the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?

I do think bitcoin IS widely used by criminals. Media is not spreading completely false information. The point is USD is also widely used by criminals and people are used to it. Media believes "bitcoin" is more news worthy.

No, I don't like it. There is no advantage when bitcoin is being associated with crimes. When Bitcoin is portrayed as criminal money, real users like us have to explain to people that this isn't the case. It isn't easy too. While explaining to them, I have to consciously avoid bitcoin's role in gambling, scams and prostitution too.

I believe we simply need to wait for more commonly legit way of spending bitcoin before this stereotype can disappear.

[prodigy8]

Well i don't know why people accuse bitcoin.
And don't accuse the thief or kidnapper which is trying to leave negative to bitcoin.
What must we say when this man asks in dollars, should dollar consider as a bad thing?

[ranochigo]

In general, they do more harm to Bitcoin. People would link Bitcoin to criminal activities. It would hinder the adoption rate as most would think it is illegal as it is easily used for criminal activites. On the other side, bad publicity is still publicity. It still allows the mass public to know the existence of Bitcoin and some may research on it.

[unamis76]

I don't see how this could be positive in any way, especially in what concerns mainstream media and how they display Bitcoin. Virtual currencies are being shown to be powered by criminals, for criminals, just because someone buys drugs with those instead of fiat

Never seen this kind of propaganda about fiat currencies, especially on media that's controlled by governments.

That being said, looks like pretty much anything on the news about Bitcoin isn't that good...

[christycalhoun]

I am for any sort of activity as long as it helps bring up the price. It is so easy to launder money with bitcoins so of course there will be criminals.

[Q7]

Nope it's the other way round. The problem is the media has been spinning all the information they want it to so that they can sell the news. Fact is all the negative revelations are actually hurting bitcoin reputation is some way or another. Not that we can control it but if only there is something that can be done to change it.

[JeWay]

I suggest it's as a advantage, it's good for me as long as the price increase

[darkangel11]

Yes, I think they bring a lot of attention to Bitcoin and put it in the news. It's free advertising where's the harm in that?

[franky1]

Lately I have seen another news of some kidnappers demanding ransom in bitcoin. Then the family seems to be really bought $1.7M worth of BTC (about 5.5k BTC as my estimate). This would be one of the reason for the recent price increase ($1.7M is a lot of money!). However medias keep spreading false information on bitcoin, like stating 'bitcoin is using widely in criminals' etc.

So how do you think? Does the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?

if it wasnt for the likes of silkroad, world media would never have really started to report/investigate bitcoin.
so although the criminal use of bitcoin is bad for bitcoins reputation, it has helped give alot of free advertising and got discussions happening in the real world, sparking peoples need to look into things they dont fully understand.

but now i think that good news, such as bloomberg and RT saying about bitcoin being an investment option has prompted alot of investors to get in on it. rather then the silk road stuff