Russia joins North Korea - blocks bitcoin exchanges

[LiteCoinGuy]

Bitstamp and BTC-e now blocked by Russian ISPs

https://twitter.com/btcecom/status/690539469167026178

Meanwhile...

[newIndia]

Is LocalBitcoins blocked too ?

[Amph]

until they block all the vpn and vps provider, they are doing nothing there, if they are intelligent enough they should know this

besides youc an always trade bitcoin in other way and with plenty of other website

[SuperCoinGuy]

BTC-e exchange is based in Russia isn't it? Can the Russians circumvent this by using a VPN?

[spazzdla]

They are basically trying to ban gold.. GOOD LUCK NOOBS.

[unamis76]

BTC-e exchange is based in Russia isn't it? Can the Russians circumvent this by using a VPN?

I wrote a comment a while back on why it's really not clear that BTC-e is in Bulgaria, since it's a particularly persistent point of contention, but decided I might as well pull it all into one post.
1) BTC-e's creators are Russian.
Qouting the linked CoinDesk article:
BTC-e is anything but transparent: it uses third-party banking services to keep its name out of official records. At least one of the banks involved in the process is located in the Czech Republic; the BTC-e site references Bulgaria in its SEO descriptions; the founders, Russian programmers Aleksey and Alexander, honed their skills at the Skolkovo tech park; and the BTC-e managing company is based in Cyprus.
2) Their previous domain registrar is Russian.
3) They use Cloudflare, a service to prevent DDoSing that masks where a website is hosted, so you cannot tell where their servers are located.
4) Their TOS now refers to Cyprus, not Bulgaria as it did in the past.
5) The only place on their website where Bulgaria is mentioned is the search engine description.
6) The only languages the websites support are Russian, Chinese, and English; their support site is in Russian and English, and the documention for their beta API is written only in Russian.

Source

Nobody know where they really are, basically. And yes, they can probably use a VPN.

Also, they already have an alternate link working for Russian users: https://btc-e.nz/

[mayax]

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/bitcoin-exchange-btc-e-blocked-russian-regulator/

it happened with Bistamp too but "I like" the way Bitstamp is saying ". Bitstamp is a recognized leader in operating a safe, fully compliant exchange"

WTF!?!? They lost 5 mil last year (recognized leader in operating a safe) and how are they fully compliant when Bitstamp is NOT a financial license company? They are not audited, they are not under any authority. Compliant with whom? )

They are liars

[pawel7777]

Not much of a move against Bitcoin per se, more of preventing Ruble from dropping even further.

[Ya-ing]

That blocks mass adoption a little. But Bitcoin users tend to be tech-guys that can easily use some method to still access exchanges.

[gentlemand]

I was under the impression that Bitstamp themselves had blocked Russian users. I could be wrong. I wonder when all this Russian crap will be settled. One person says they're jailing everyone ever, then the next minute some banking official shouts about being rather fond of it all.

[QuestionAuthority]

FYI: BTCe moved to Cyprus a couple years ago.

[Pab]

Russian gov is working for offiicial  btc banThay will be first and only one  what will consider btc like a illigal
Why Dictatorship

[jacktheking]

Russia is the largest country in the world. Blocking it will affect a lot of Bitcoiner that uses Bitstamps and BTC-e. Thankfully that there is ways to bypass the block or just simply use another site. The bad thing here is that new Russian will not know about the existence of cryptocurrency.

until they block all the vpn and vps provider, they are doing nothign there, if they are intelligent enough they should know this

besides youc an always trade bitcoin in other way and with plenty of other website

Yes agree. I'd say that the majority of Bitcoiners is very tech-savvy. They would simply use a VPN, VPS or Tor Browser to bypass the blocked sites.

[White sugar]

Such useless effort to block sites, can be bypassed easily thru vpn or proxy tho,different if they do arrest bitcoin user

Not useless, will make people be afraid that in the future they do arrest people or cut the fiat-BTC channel, so people will avoid invest in Bitcoins and the adoption will stop.

[funkenstein]

Such useless effort to block sites, can be bypassed easily thru vpn or proxy tho,different if they do arrest bitcoin user

Not useless, will make people be afraid that in the future they do arrest people or cut the fiat-BTC channel, so people will avoid invest in Bitcoins and the adoption will stop.

Yeah kinda like when water sees a net ahead in the river and decides to flow uphill to avoid it. 

[AliceWonderMiscreations]

BTC-e exchange is based in Russia isn't it? Can the Russians circumvent this by using a VPN?

I wrote a comment a while back on why it's really not clear that BTC-e is in Bulgaria, since it's a particularly persistent point of contention, but decided I might as well pull it all into one post.
1) BTC-e's creators are Russian.
Qouting the linked CoinDesk article:
BTC-e is anything but transparent: it uses third-party banking services to keep its name out of official records. At least one of the banks involved in the process is located in the Czech Republic; the BTC-e site references Bulgaria in its SEO descriptions; the founders, Russian programmers Aleksey and Alexander, honed their skills at the Skolkovo tech park; and the BTC-e managing company is based in Cyprus.
2) Their previous domain registrar is Russian.
3) They use Cloudflare, a service to prevent DDoSing that masks where a website is hosted, so you cannot tell where their servers are located.
4) Their TOS now refers to Cyprus, not Bulgaria as it did in the past.
5) The only place on their website where Bulgaria is mentioned is the search engine description.
6) The only languages the websites support are Russian, Chinese, and English; their support site is in Russian and English, and the documention for their beta API is written only in Russian.

Source

Nobody know where they really are, basically. And yes, they can probably use a VPN.

Also, they already have an alternate link working for Russian users: https://btc-e.nz/

Do they have some sort of cryptographic method in place that users can use to make sure an alternate domain is not a fishing attempt?

e.g. DNSSEC for the server, posting the public signing key signed by a known key from the old site?

[Jet Cash]

Russia seems to be ambivalent towards Bitcoin, and their attitude may be coloured by their ambition to have oil prices quoted in Rubles rather than dollars. They are also buying physical gold, and this may be to underpin the future value of the Ruble. I suspect that the volume of Bitcoin transactions may not be significant in their economy, but they seem to want to keep out Jamie Dimon derivatives problems, and this may have got linked into Bitcoin in some way. There is an article about this in Bitcoin magazine.

https://bitcoinmagazine.com/articles/russia-makes-an-election-year-for-bitcoin-1453484141

[justspare]

I really don't know why Russia would do this. I know that Bitcoin isn't very prominent in Russia but still.  

[mayax]

FYI: BTCe moved to Cyprus a couple years ago.

If they did that, then BTC-e must have a financial license according to EU laws. I am sure they don't have it as many other exchangers.
All the exchangers are making millions of USD(or at least this what they say) but when it's about to get a financial license, only 2-3 have it.

The question is WHY if they are correct and have nothing to hide. Bitstamp is one of them too. Based in EU, they are dealing with US clients but no license.

Kraken in USA and I think they will be raided soon. They are based in USA but no financial license. They are stupids or  too arrogant to realize that it's not a joke and that they can stand behind bars for years. A forum or a Coindesk cannot protect you agains FEDs or Police.
Yes, yes, many of you will say "don't care" but...make a search and you will find a lot of people in jail because of their arrogance.

Also, when Feds or police will raid(it's just a matter of them) one of these big exchanger, BE SURE your funds will be gone(seized).

They posed like Bitcoin gods and now they are crying in cells along with a "daddy"

[DecentralizeEconomics]

Can't block decentralized NXT multigateway exchanges which allow you to trade BTC and a multitude of alts.