Expect ransomware arrests soon, says bitcoin tracking firm Chainalysis

[Azael]

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450302807/Expect-ransomware-arrests-soon-says-bitcoin-tracking-firm-Chainalysis

What are your thoughts on this? When you trade Bitcoin with someone you might be getting tainted coins that put you in danger.

[Azael]

Relevant to the topic

https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/eu-central-database-bitcoin-users/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/4v28jl/how_have_fungiblity_problems_affected_you_in/

[Milkduds]

“Bitcoin transactions used to be anonymous, but our software is capable of linking the source and recipient, so, in effect, bitcoin has become less anonymous than cash,” he said.

This presumes that the people doing this are using the same locations more than once and not moving around. The point that sticks out when I read articles that talk about bitcoin being less anon,is the leaps in talking points as if every one approaches bitcoin in the same manner.

The other aspect is with every hole that is closed off,new holes are created.

There have already been some arrests as a result of law enforcement using the Chainalysis technology, said Gronager, relating to the cyber extortion gang known as DD4BC (DDoS for bitcoin).

The article points to high profile cases and mentions involvement but nothing about solving a case and then they mention in this quote "some arrests",so I doubt it is as air tight as they want you to think. Its a good promotion job more than anything in my eyes.
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Edit:

I posted before the links where added and think the first one just points to the whole vibe or Europe wanting to encircle the internet,which will not be easy with America wanting to own it as well. To many chiefs at the party will cause it go at a very slow pace to achieve this goal if anything. Their was a similar article about the U.K wanting to control another aspect of the internet recently but it eludes my memory.

[bathrobehero]

There's always tumbling. Or depositing BTC to an exchange, trading that BTC to another coin, withdrawing that coin and turning that into cash or back to BTC on another exchange.

[European Central Bank]

Or depositing BTC to an exchange, trading that BTC to another coin, withdrawing that coin and turning that into cash or back to BTC on another exchange.

the exchange knows your addresses and might have your real details too. and most of them are gonna be very keen to please law enforcement. I use them myself for that but i'm not doing anything wrong and don't care about that.

[ebliever]

Ransomware is fantastically irritating and a great blight on efforts to mainstream bitcoin by providing a positive image to people. The only downside here to the possibility that law enforcement will soon lay hands on some of the criminals involved is that it means vigilante mobs won't be getting to them first and hanging them from the nearest lamppost.

[ArticMine]

This kind of thing fails the concept of innocent until proven guilty, and actually has to potential to bring down Bitcoin. So  a law abiding citizen buys Bitcoin from an exchange with her hard earned money and users her Bitcoin for a perfectly legal payment. She then gets accused of a criminal offense by some proprietary analytics program, because those Bitcoins were used for a criminal act x number of transactions back. This issue was actually settled by the courts in Scotland in the mid 1700's https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1qomqt/what_a_landmark_legal_case_from_mid1700s_scotland/ in Crawfurd v. The Royal Bank

Putting an end to this Chainalysis nonsense and respecting the legal precedent of the fungibility of money is one of the major features of Monero over Bitcoin.

As for the "problem" it can be easily solved by replacing Microsoft Windows with its DRM motivated registry with GNU / Linux. There is no need to drag innocent people through the courts in order to protect a software operating system design motivated by DRM.

[bbc.reporter]

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450302807/Expect-ransomware-arrests-soon-says-bitcoin-tracking-firm-Chainalysis

What are your thoughts on this? When you trade Bitcoin with someone you might be getting tainted coins that put you in danger.

You are putting too much thought in the issue. "Tainted coins" and "fungibility" are an overused concept and some people think it that it will affect the "value" of their bitcoins. If it really does ok please sell me darknet coins for $300 per bitcoin. I will happily take them away from your hands.

[ArticMine]

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450302807/Expect-ransomware-arrests-soon-says-bitcoin-tracking-firm-Chainalysis

What are your thoughts on this? When you trade Bitcoin with someone you might be getting tainted coins that put you in danger.

You are putting too much thought in the issue. "Tainted coins" and "fungibility" are an overused concept and some people think it that it will affect the "value" of their bitcoins. If it really does ok please sell me darknet coins for $300 per bitcoin. I will happily take them away from your hands.

You may be right, the market may make "Tainted Coins" irrelevant or courts may make "Tainted Coins" irrelevant in crypto currency using the Crawfurd v. The Royal Bank precedent.

I see one of three options here:
1) Chainanlysis and similar companies become irrelevant and likely end up in bankruptcy court.
2) Chainanlysis and similar companies make a business out of selling compliance snake oil
3) Chainanlysis and similar companies destroy Bitcoin, and then also become irrelevant and likely end up in bankruptcy court as in (1).

[bbc.reporter]

@ArcticMine. Or ransomware creators will start asking XMR payments making Chainanlysis obsolete and useless. As a test I am partly hoping that they start using XMR not that I want honest people to become victims of ransomware. I would only like to see how the authorities figure out tracing Monero transactions.

[ArticMine]

@ArcticMine. Or ransomware creators will start asking XMR payments making Chainanlysis obsolete and useless. As a test I am partly hoping that they start using XMR not that I want honest people to become victims of ransomware. I would only like to see how the authorities figure out tracing Monero transactions.

it is not just the ransomware creators, the real market for XMR is those that do not want to be falsely accused of a criminal offense.

Edit: I see Chainanalysis as nothing more than a parasite of Bitcoin.

[dinofelis]

Edit: I see Chainanalysis as nothing more than a parasite of Bitcoin.

Feynman said once: if it can happen, it will happen.  Chainanalysis is just the normal implementation of the transparency of the bitcoin block chain.  If you implement transparency, then it is somehow normal that people start looking at it.

I consider the block chain transparency as the biggest problem with bitcoin.  It is understandable, because it was the first crypto.  Satoshi got an amazing lot of stuff right for a first go.  But this is one of the points where he got it wrong, thinking that the pseudonymity would have been sufficient, and forgetting that the joins of several inputs in a transaction, and several outputs of a transaction, make a network that can propagate partial knowledge of identities.

[bathrobehero]

Or depositing BTC to an exchange, trading that BTC to another coin, withdrawing that coin and turning that into cash or back to BTC on another exchange.

the exchange knows your addresses and might have your real details too. and most of them are gonna be very keen to please law enforcement. I use them myself for that but i'm not doing anything wrong and don't care about that.

They not necessarily know your address. I don't do anything illegal but I have never given my info to any exchange and I still can use plenty of them. All the big ones included.

A centralized exchange knowing your identity I think defeats the purpose of crypto. And exchanges are always a target of hack attempts so generally it's just a matter of time before they get hacked at which point there's a good chance user info leaks as well.



To be on topic, on paper it's nice but I suspect people behind ransomwares are smart enough to not get caught (hope I'm wrong though).

And what if they sell their BTC outside of exchanges, the unsuspecting new owner of the coins gets his door kicked in?

[awesome31312]

Innocent until proven guilty. Even if you can prove the funds came from a particular address, you would have to prove intent, and ownership of the addresses in question.

[Spoetnik]

Bullshit.
You are posting this as you bump your other topic touting Monero as the new silk road coin.

Zip it up.. your agenda is showing honey LOL 

[awesome31312]

Good luck chasing the thousands of addresses out there. I'm pretty sure the state has better things to do with their time

[bbc.reporter]

Innocent until proven guilty. Even if you can prove the funds came from a particular address, you would have to prove intent, and ownership of the addresses in question.

This is where the flaw in the system is shown. Do you think that the justice system is really fair? That it cannot be "rigged" and the judge influenced to make a verdict in favor of the authorities? Do you still believe in your justice system?

[Azael]

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450302807/Expect-ransomware-arrests-soon-says-bitcoin-tracking-firm-Chainalysis

What are your thoughts on this? When you trade Bitcoin with someone you might be getting tainted coins that put you in danger.

You are putting too much thought in the issue. "Tainted coins" and "fungibility" are an overused concept and some people think it that it will affect the "value" of their bitcoins.

People put too little thought into this. Forget the block size debate if you don't even have a payment network where buyer and seller are safe.

It's not about the value of my Bitcoins I have since long considered them more like digital gold than currency anyway.

Take this example you buy some Bitcoins from X and the next thing you know the police wants to know where you got them who you bought it from who you are etc etc they want to dig into you like really waste your time and well whatever it is they do. Perhaps they make you give up the seller to prove your innocence who turns out to be some madman?

Now maybe this doesn't concern you but tell me for somebody wanting to use Bitcoin as a currency like actually buying goods outside DNMs why would you?
This design for a payment network is reckless and I wonder for somebody buying and selling actual goods for Bitcoin how many troubles they encounter over a year and how many times they worry over who is paying them Bitcoin and where it comes from.

[Azael]

You are posting this as you bump your other topic touting Monero

Zip it up.. your agenda is showing honey LOL 

My signature should give you a clue! Things like these are obviously very bullish for Monero.

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/450302807/Expect-ransomware-arrests-soon-says-bitcoin-tracking-firm-Chainalysis
https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/eu-central-database-bitcoin-users/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/4v28jl/how_have_fungiblity_problems_affected_you_in/

[Azael]

Good luck chasing the thousands of addresses out there. I'm pretty sure the state has better things to do with their time

I bet it's a piece of cake. I mean Google keeps pretty good track of all their users.