Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins?

[Milkduds]

You either have freedom or you have nothing and that is pretty much how bitcoin works. You start making rules to track or attack people with nefarious ideas/plans and you kill bitcoin in the process. May not be right away but a gradual decline would for sure happen as the markets reflect the change.

[zombie007]

Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins? What if there would be a law punishing those who steal bitcoins and those people behind scam sites? And if so, is it necessary to have such law? I'm just wondering, if there would be such law about stolen bitcoins, it could be a big relief to us bitcoin users. But then, there are so many questions and issues that goes with this ideal that makes me skeptical about it. 

It is never yet implemented and we have not read any case involving Bitcoin theft,the country that will implement this,should have a complete knowledge on how bitcoin works and that country is actually using bitcoin as one of their currency,I doubt if this will happen.

yes i also think so that there is still no law implemeted, and i think the main reason is that bitcoin is still not consider as legal currency by any country therefore it is very difficult that any government has yet implement any law for stolen bitcoins as the government has no concern with stolen bitcoins.

[harizen]

Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins? What if there would be a law punishing those who steal bitcoins and those people behind scam sites? And if so, is it necessary to have such law? I'm just wondering, if there would be such law about stolen bitcoins, it could be a big relief to us bitcoin users. But then, there are so many questions and issues that goes with this ideal that makes me skeptical about it. 

By any means, if an exchange site is a registered company, meaning personal infos of the owners and it's staff are being presented to the government then they are facing the laws under money regulation of a certain country and they have to comply with it. Obviously if they will turned to a fraud one, authorities will seek them.

But you know majority of people that preferred bitcoin because of that freedom thing must take care of their coins by themselves and don't blame anyone why it got steal. They want a full extent of freedom of using bitcoin outside the government premises but asking for a law about stolen coins? It doesn't make sense since for government to truly pass a law about stolen coins, bitcoin must be regulated first which others don't like. They must deal with it.

[seven2smoke]

Bitcoin, the Internet currency beloved by computer scientists, libertarians, and criminals, is no longer invulnerable. As recently as 3 years ago, it seemed that anyone could buy or sell anything with Bitcoin and never be tracked, let alone busted if they broke the law. “It’s totally anonymous,” was how one commenter put it in Bitcoin's forums in June 2013. “The FBI does not have a prayer of a chance of finding out who is who.”


The FBI and other law enforcement begged to differ. Ross Ulbricht, the 31-year-old American who created Silk Road, a Bitcoin market facilitating the sale of $1 billion in illegal drugs, was sentenced to life in prison in February 2015. In March, the assets of 28-year-old Czech national Tomáš Jiříkovský were seized; he’s suspected of laundering $40 million in stolen Bitcoins. Two more fell in September 2015: 33-year-old American Trendon Shavers pleaded guilty to running a $150 million Ponzi scheme—the first Bitcoin securities fraud case—and 30-year-old Frenchman Mark Karpelès was arrested and charged with fraud and embezzlement of $390 million from the now shuttered Bitcoin currency exchange Mt. Gox.


The majority of Bitcoin users are law-abiding people motivated by privacy concerns or just curiosity. But Bitcoin’s anonymity is also a powerful tool for financing crime: The virtual money can keep shady transactions secret. The paradox of cryptocurrency is that its associated data create a forensic trail that can suddenly make your entire financial history public information.

[avatar_kiyoshi]

Interesting topic.
Well at the beginning bitcoin designed decentralized which it's not covered by government and law. This is impossible to reporting to cybercrime police if your coin stolen, instead it can be a boomerang if your country doesn't allow bitcoin activity.

But the question is how there's country who make it legal for bitcoin so, we can report it to the police if we got stolen our bitcoin?

well if you're living in a region which already regulate bitcoin,i guess there must be such a rule thatprotect bitcoin users against criminality,and especially if government already taxed those bitcoin users,then protection for a bitcoin users is a must and it could be considered as using usual currency so normal law will be used

I see, I research too, about bitcoin regulations and law. And found something interesting:
https://coincheck.com/en/blog/1226
https://news.bitcoin.com/japan-passes-law-regulation-bitcoin/
Anyway if bitcoin have a regulations from all country, maybe more comfortable to do bitcoin activity, unless maybe corrupt country.

[davis196]

Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins? What if there would be a law punishing those who steal bitcoins and those people behind scam sites? And if so, is it necessary to have such law? I'm just wondering, if there would be such law about stolen bitcoins, it could be a big relief to us bitcoin users. But then, there are so many questions and issues that goes with this ideal that makes me skeptical about it. 

Stealing bitcoins is like stealing fiat money.

There`s no need of a law regarding bitcoin theft.

If there was such law,this won`t stop bitcoin scammers.

[SamMurphy]

I don't think that can be a law. Nobody can't use the lost bitcoins, so I don't think that someone can put law on the stolen ones. And how can we know which bitcoins are stolen and how someone can prove it?

[mrcash02]

As Bitcoin is an anonymous currency, I think the law can't help with that. We already saw here a lot of scammers and hackers stealling bitcoins and nothing happened to them. Here on forum they can be negatived and banned, but on the real world nothing happen to them.

Althought they are banned from bitcointalk forum they can continue creating methods and schemes to steal peopleon the internet. That is disadvantage of using bitcoins.

[danfoda]

Firstly, bitcoin theft is impossible to trace. Secondly, stealing someones elses money is illegal anywhere in the world (duh lol). But since bitcoin has no owner, thus no one controls it - private or goverments, theres no one to enforce those laws. Even if there were laws, for which country would this law apply??

[krishna1]

well if you can track down those bitcoin thievies then your are welcome to take actions on them like polic complains or etc but i do not find it save that fbi will search the whole network just to find your guy remember everyone needs privacy

[hua_hui]

Firstly, bitcoin theft is impossible to trace. Secondly, stealing someones elses money is illegal anywhere in the world (duh lol). But since bitcoin has no owner, thus no one controls it - private or goverments, theres no one to enforce those laws. Even if there were laws, for which country would this law apply??

btc theft is not impossible to trace, possible but extremely difficult. However on the other hand, the owner of kickass got arrest because he use legal money to buy on app store.

[bitbunnny]

Stealing of anything is illegal and this is the crime everywhere in the world. There is no need for separate law to protect just Bitcoin. And no country would make such law.
The difference and also the problem with stealing Bitcoins compared with stealing fiat is the greater anonimity of Bitcoin transactions so it's much harder to trace them.

[MONKEYJUNK]

Firstly, bitcoin theft is impossible to trace. Secondly, stealing someones elses money is illegal anywhere in the world (duh lol). But since bitcoin has no owner, thus no one controls it - private or goverments, theres no one to enforce those laws. Even if there were laws, for which country would this law apply??

btc theft is not impossible to trace, possible but extremely difficult. However on the other hand, the owner of kickass got arrest because he use legal money to buy on app store.

If the guy steal a lot of money, one day he will have to spend it in somewhere or trade for fiat on an exchange, so in this way you can find the guy...
On the other side he can buy some anonymous altcoin and make the things more hard.

[franky1]

the current system of law covers theft by anything physical and digital..

the problem..
identifying the culprit.

no law can remedy this, because no scammer would follow the law by identifying himself in the first place.

in short. if you dont want to get scammed dont use shady blackmarket sites. dont hand funds to people you dont know enough about to slap them with a wet fish if they wrong you.

[outatime1]

The problem is that it is very hard to catch those that steal bitcoins because of the anonymity. In many cases the thief is most likely in another country which makes it even harder to track.

[serjent05]

The problem is that it is very hard to catch those that steal bitcoins because of the anonymity. In many cases the thief is most likely in another country which makes it even harder to track.

Even if the authority catches those people who steal bitcoin, the problem is, there is no one owns bitcoin so basically you cannot file a complaint of thief because you don't have a proof of ownership over that bitcoin.  Sad but it is true that people who stole lots of bitcoin had gone out of prison because of this issue.

[rik3]

Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins? What if there would be a law punishing those who steal bitcoins and those people behind scam sites? And if so, is it necessary to have such law? I'm just wondering, if there would be such law about stolen bitcoins, it could be a big relief to us bitcoin users. But then, there are so many questions and issues that goes with this ideal that makes me skeptical about it. 

Bro There are Already Some Laws Created For this Type Of Crimes Like Steal Bitcoin From a Wallet Or A Person Scammed Many Bitcoins From Others Then He Can be Punished For that If He Caught By any country.....
Because Theft and Scamming People is illegal in every Country......

[delliaerd]

Could there be a law on stolen bitcoins? What if there would be a law punishing those who steal bitcoins and those people behind scam sites? And if so, is it necessary to have such law? I'm just wondering, if there would be such law about stolen bitcoins, it could be a big relief to us bitcoin users. But then, there are so many questions and issues that goes with this ideal that makes me skeptical about it. 

Bro There are Already Some Laws Created For this Type Of Crimes Like Steal Bitcoin From a Wallet Or A Person Scammed Many Bitcoins From Others Then He Can be Punished For that If He Caught By any country.....
Because Theft and Scamming People is illegal in every Country......

I am not sure, becouse no body know who stoled the bitcoin, in Exception if there is something like history of transaction that enclosed in bitcoin. But this idea just make bitcoin anonimity no more. But I still support if there are some people are country that give punishment to scammer or any people who do ing cyber crime. I hope all of country believe in bitcoin and support it. It is will good if country support bitcoin.investment.

[Conus]

There are laws in which this falls under, it is called theft and fraud.  The issue is that there are not enough information about the Bitcoin and not enough funds to help prevent bitcoin from being stolen.  As soon as a enforcement agency comes into play, then there will be issues and problems for these thieves.

[madwica]

I do not think there is a law in stolen bitcoin yet since bitcoin is not government regulated there is no policy approved by the law. And also it is hard to trace who are the one liable in staling bitcoin.