Bitcoin-24.com matching engine seems broken, site down.

[darnth]

Ok, here we go.
Short warning, if you think Simons english is a bit incoherent, the German isnt really much better. Hes probably just really stressed out/on the edge and also not used to writing public announcements (no clear structure or consistent train of thought). My translation isnt very literal at places, as its easier for me to write semi-fine english sentences than to translate slightly garbled german literally into english. If the english is still garbled, its usually not my fault , but the german being sloppy/ambiguous.

Disclaimer: I ALSO DONT CLAIM ACCURACY OF THIS UNOFFICIAL TRANSLATION, of course. I am trying to be as accurate as possible, as some wording used is very sensitive to interpretation, but I am just some user trying to help, you know how to take that.

We are already a small step further.
The biggest problem is that whatever I publish is depicted as "fake".

Things that are a very serious topic, are one the other hand somehow ridiculous.

Why was there a need for an account at Commerzbank?
There were issues with "Sofortueberweisung", hence I added the Giropay option to Bitcoin-24 and Giropay required a german account.
My bank counselor at Commerzbank was informed in detail about the plans for the account and the expected business volume.
So the Commerzbank account was used as the german one required by Giropay.

Why was the polish account frozen?
The polish account was frozen as the criminal investigation department of the Bremen police requested legal and administrative cooperation.
The polish administration did not file any charges against me on their own, and why should they?
The polish administration simply heard the words "money laundering and terrorist financing" and froze the account.
A formal objection was filed against the freezing of the account on April 16.

Who or what is behind all this, and what are the reasons?
The reason is serious as well as ridiculous! So ridiculous that some might think its a joke:
The Commerzbank in Bremen reported to the police that I often did cash transactions. I am perfectly well entitled to withdraw cash, and I think you know that many people supporting bitcoin dont really trust financial institutions.
The cash transactions have NOTHING AT ALL to do with customer deposits. I assure you of that!
It was always either profit from fees of "Same-Day" bank transfer, from parcels or from donations.

Now the situation is that the Commerzbank account only got payments from Giropay. These payments belong to the business, but I withdrew the above profits from the Commerzbank account nonetheless. As already said this is not illegal and I am perfectly entitled to do so.
The Commerzbank is now accusing me of the following:

[...] he intends to have at his disposal, in cash and for his own ends, the sums of money transfered via Giropay to his account at Commerzbank Bremen from his customers to buy and trade with Bitcoins [...]

This is in no way correct, as ALSO a large part of the customer account deposits are at Commerzbank.
The Commerzbank now reported this "practice" to the criminal investigation department Bremen, who then impounded the Commerzbank account. Including a large part of customer account deposits.

What is the current situation:
As mentioned above, a formal objection was filed against the freezing of the polish account, as there was no reason for this.
Against the Commerzbank a lawsuit is being filed, as they caused very high damage.
1. The blocking of the account in Poland 2. The blocking of the account in Germany 3. My inability to act/do business as director of BTC24 Limited.

People, what are you thinking of me? That I am on some island, driving a fat car and having a life of leisure?
NO! My life is exactly as before and will certainly do NOTHING to the customer deposits!
Of course, non-profit and everything! But the "Same-Day" bank transfers, of which there were about 20 per day with a fee of 1%, are creating enough profit from the trading platform!

I wanted to create something where people can trade with bitcoins. I managed to do that. But then they try to take this away from me and destroy it by blocking my accounts!
As sorry as I am for everyone, its basically really not my fault! I used two different accounts, where both banks knew what I am doing and what business volume would register on the accounts.
Despite all the "Where is Simon Hausdorf" business I will not go into hiding and I am standing openly by what happened and how things proceed. But for this its required that the users/you believe me.

For real! If I had wanted to play you for a sucker, why am I writing this and why didnt I walk off with the 5 Million? Ok, maybe because I cant access the money, but wouldnt I have been able to do this much earlier? People, the money doesn't interest me at all! My motivation is really different.

The clerks/officers dont even care for me telling them that I cant conduct my business due to the account blocking, and that with certainty there will be some lawsuits being filed against my company.
Lawsuits also means even more problem with the police and the public prosecution department.

They simply dont understand how it is possible to have such a high business volume in such a short amount of time.
The money is and always was on these accounts and I NEVER touched it! All payments are documented/traceable and there were no problems ever to process withdrawals, apart from at the end, for the reasons given above!

Edit: Small hint, stop doing stuff like the Facebook groups.
1. Its dissimulation
2. Violation of copyright of some images
3. There are a number of threats
4. Its like a witch-hunt / as well as death threats
5. Charges were filed against Thomas Staegle

Personally I sort of believe Simon that its no scam, but I am not entirely sure whether his withdrawals from the account were legit and they DO accuse him of embezzlement. I am no expert on business practices and dont know exactly how the account was set up, so no idea whether the practices described by him are ok.

[1714192503]

1714192503

[1714192503]

1714192503

[DeathAndTaxes]

Yeah if he isn't up to a scam why not return the BTC.  In any exchange the BTC is roughly half of the clients assets.  Returning millions of EUR worth of BTC would likely be a massive sign of good faith.  The fact that in that long rambling nonsense (which really doesn't tell anything new that we didn't know on day0) he doesn't even mention BTC is very telling.

I mean he is holding tens of thousands of BTC.  People have pointed this out hundreds of times.  Every single response seems to not only not address it but actually just ignore it.  BTC? What BTC?

[darnth]

Also, on bitcoin24-help, an unofficial translation (by some other helpful user, thanks!) of a search warrant from the police can be found:
http://board.btc24-help.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=40

Very interesting, as is Simons post. It looks like they really think he would have run away with the fiat when the platform closed and accuse him of embezzlement.

[mybitcoincharts]

Yeah if he isn't up to a scam why not return the BTC. 

Because then the state prosecutor could argue that withdrawing the btc means Simon tries to launder the money he got from the fictious fishing attack. Right now they only have the spike of incoming money as circumstantial evidence. If he would start transacting bitcoins now, that could obviously be seen as him hiding evidence.

[darnth]

thanks a lot for the time and effort

Youre welcome!
Just thought, as people were repeatedly asking Simon to post in German before, as someone can surely quickly translate to result in something more legible than his english posts, that if there is no other someone in time, it might as well be me

[bitbadger]

ALL the action seems to be taking place at:

http://board.btc24-help.com

There is also an English subforum.

No answer there why BTC is still being held hostage.

If the computer equipment has been seized by the police, then it may not be possible to return the BTC at this stage, unless there's a reliable backup somewhere else.

[bitbadger]

r to process withdrawals, apart from at the end, for the reasons given above!

Edit: Small hint, stop doing stuff like the Facebook groups.
1. Its dissimulation
2. Violation of copyright of some images
3. There are a number of threats
4. Its like a with-hunt / as well as death threats
5. Charges were filed against Thomas Staegle

Personally I sort of believe Simon that its no scam, but I am not entirely sure whether his withdrawals from the account were legit and they DO accuse him of embezzlement. I am no expert on business practices and dont know exactly how the account was set up, so no idea whether the practices described by him are ok.

[/quote]
thanks a lot for the time and effort
[/quote]
All this scammer accusation stuff is just people's fears and imagination running wild.

Im pretty sure he is no scammer, he is just a "kid" who has unfortunately got himself and his business into one hell of a mess that he now has to try and get out of.

[greyhawk]

Im pretty sure he is no scammer, he is just a "kid"

sure enough

[dscotese]

I have no evidence to suggest to me that anyone reading bitcoin24 or btc24-help dot com is NOT an idiot.  Why are these pages not on the bitcoin-24.com domain?  Sorry for calling you all idiots, but I think it's important to point out that no one has addressed this question.

My best guess is that over half of the people posting on this thread are attempting to exploit both bitcoin-24 and its customers.  Now is the time to do that because everyone is freaked out.  The other half just aren't asking the right questions.  WTF is wrong with you?

If someone can point out a legitimate reason for the alternate domain names, I will happily express shame and apologize.

[bootlace]

I have no evidence to suggest to me that anyone reading bitcoin24 or btc24-help dot com is NOT an idiot.  Why are these pages not on the bitcoin-24.com domain?  Sorry for calling you all idiots, but I think it's important to point out that no one has addressed this question.

My best guess is that over half of the people posting on this thread are attempting to exploit both bitcoin-24 and its customers.  Now is the time to do that because everyone is freaked out.  The other half just aren't asking the right questions.  WTF is wrong with you?

If someone can point out a legitimate reason for the alternate domain names, I will happily express shame and apologize.

One of th BTC24 users started the alternate site to coordinate and centralize communications and help efforts - it is not affiliate to BTC24 nor does it claim to.

[bootlace]

Ok, here we go.
Short warning, if you think Simons english is a bit incoherent, the German isnt really much better. Hes probably just really stressed out/on the edge and also not used to writing public announcements (no clear structure or consistent train of thought). My translation isnt very literal at places, as its easier for me to write semi-fine english sentences than to translate slightly garbled german literally into english. If the english is still garbled, its usually not my fault , but the german being sloppy/ambiguous.

Disclaimer: I ALSO DONT CLAIM ACCURACY OF THIS UNOFFICIAL TRANSLATION, of course. I am trying to be as accurate as possible, as some wording used is very sensitive to interpretation, but I am just some user trying to help, you know how to take that.

We are already a small step further.
The biggest problem is that whatever I publish is depicted as "fake".

Things that are a very serious topic, are one the other hand somehow ridiculous.

Why was there a need for an account at Commerzbank?
There were issues with "Sofortueberweisung", hence I added the Giropay option to Bitcoin-24 and Giropay required a german account.
My bank counselor at Commerzbank was informed in detail about the plans for the account and the expected business volume.
So the Commerzbank account was used as the german one required by Giropay.

Why was the polish account frozen?
The polish account was frozen as the criminal investigation department of the Bremen police requested legal and administrative cooperation.
The polish administration did not file any charges against me on their own, and why should they?
The polish administration simply heard the words "money laundering and terrorist financing" and froze the account.
A formal objection was filed against the freezing of the account on April 16.

Who or what is behind all this, and what are the reasons?
The reason is serious as well as ridiculous! So ridiculous that some might think its a joke:
The Commerzbank in Bremen reported to the police that I often did cash transactions. I am perfectly well entitled to withdraw cash, and I think you know that many people supporting bitcoin dont really trust financial institutions.
The cash transactions have NOTHING AT ALL to do with customer deposits. I assure you of that!
It was always either profit from fees of "Same-Day" bank transfer, from parcels or from donations.

Now the situation is that the Commerzbank account only got payments from Giropay. These payments belong to the business, but I withdrew the above profits from the Commerzbank account nonetheless. As already said this is not illegal and I am perfectly entitled to do so.
The Commerzbank is now accusing me of the following:

[...] he intends to have at his disposal, in cash and for his own ends, the sums of money transfered via Giropay to his account at Commerzbank Bremen from his customers to buy and trade with Bitcoins [...]

This is in no way correct, as ALSO a large part of the customer account deposits are at Commerzbank.
The Commerzbank now reported this "practice" to the criminal investigation department Bremen, who then impounded the Commerzbank account. Including a large part of customer account deposits.

What is the current situation:
As mentioned above, a formal objection was filed against the freezing of the polish account, as there was no reason for this.
Against the Commerzbank a lawsuit is being filed, as they caused very high damage.
1. The blocking of the account in Poland 2. The blocking of the account in Germany 3. My inability to act/do business as director of BTC24 Limited.

People, what are you thinking of me? That I am on some island, driving a fat car and having a life of leisure?
NO! My life is exactly as before and will certainly do NOTHING to the customer deposits!
Of course, non-profit and everything! But the "Same-Day" bank transfers, of which there were about 20 per day with a fee of 1%, are creating enough profit from the trading platform!

I wanted to create something where people can trade with bitcoins. I managed to do that. But then they try to take this away from me and destroy it by blocking my accounts!
As sorry as I am for everyone, its basically really not my fault! I used two different accounts, where both banks knew what I am doing and what business volume would register on the accounts.
Despite all the "Where is Simon Hausdorf" business I will not go into hiding and I am standing openly by what happened and how things proceed. But for this its required that the users/you believe me.

For real! If I had wanted to play you for a sucker, why am I writing this and why didnt I walk off with the 5 Million? Ok, maybe because I cant access the money, but wouldnt I have been able to do this much earlier? People, the money doesn't interest me at all! My motivation is really different.

The clerks/officers dont even care for me telling them that I cant conduct my business due to the account blocking, and that with certainty there will be some lawsuits being filed against my company.
Lawsuits also means even more problem with the police and the public prosecution department.

They simply dont understand how it is possible to have such a high business volume in such a short amount of time.
The money is and always was on these accounts and I NEVER touched it! All payments are documented/traceable and there were no problems ever to process withdrawals, apart from at the end, for the reasons given above!

Edit: Small hint, stop doing stuff like the Facebook groups.
1. Its dissimulation
2. Violation of copyright of some images
3. There are a number of threats
4. Its like a witch-hunt / as well as death threats
5. Charges were filed against Thomas Staegle

Personally I sort of believe Simon that its no scam, but I am not entirely sure whether his withdrawals from the account were legit and they DO accuse him of embezzlement. I am no expert on business practices and dont know exactly how the account was set up, so no idea whether the practices described by him are ok.

Thanks alot Darnth - massive contribution from your part!

[darnth]

Ok, reading the scans of documents on bitcoin-24.com again (german), the legal situation looks a bit more complicated than just one accusation.

Money laundering:
According to the documents the bank where the German account is, Commerzbank, had asked the polish bank about a number of transactions.
These transaction were from german bank accounts that fell for fishing attacks and onto the Commerzbank account. Simon then transfered funds to his polish account.
On March 5th the polish bank answered a request regarding details of these transactions, a full months before the drama started.

On April 9th his polish account was frozen. I couldnt find the actual date when the german account was impounded, but April 9th is before the big market fluctuations and days before bitcoin24 went offline.

As a comment on this, according to European laws on money laundering (which are in effect in Germany) as Simon was operating a currency exchange he had to make sure that he can answer at any point questions regarding people having deposited money with him. This is the reason e.g. Mtgox has the requirement for ID verification before one can do substantial transactions in fiat.

According to the laws, if there is any money laundering going on (which Simon cant know as he doesnt have any dependable information on users identities) he makes himself an accomplice to the money laundering as he did not take sufficient measures to try to prevent it.
Converting fiat from phished accounts to bitcoin is money laundering, so some certainly happened.

Even an unwitting accomplice to money laundering, who frivolously failed to notice the money laundering (e.g. insufficient precautions) , can be sentenced to up to two years of prison time (!).

So in contrast to what Simon said a bit ago, he is certainly responsible, for operating a platform that could easily be used for money laundering.

Three days after the polish account was blocked (!) bitcoin24.com went down. During the big trading hype Simon already knew that his main business account is blocked.

Probably after the site went down another investigation was started, this time for fraud, accusing him of trying to run off with his customers money. This accusation seems to be at least partly based on his potentially careless and regular use of the Commerzbank account to withdraw cash, and also at least partly probably on his closing the platform and hence denying the users any access to their BTC and fiat.
Some news media report that he supposedly tried to withdraw a large amount from his Commerzbank account. That could be either:
- trying to run off with it or
- knowing that the account will be frozen soon (the polish one already was), trying to get some of his customers fiat to safety
Maybe the attempted big withdraw didnt happen at all, didnt find a good source.

The search warrant basically also states that they accuse him of, since sometime in March, not being willing and able to pay back all his customers deposits anymore.

The second accusation could be just a fuck-up of the way he dealt with the trading engine problem, though from reading his posts he might have been a bit careless in doing regular cash withdraws from the Commerzbank accounts (which doesnt really help to dissuade authorities from thinking about money laundering and/or fraud).

The first one is rather serious, as many people have noticed already, as he certainly did not operate bitcoin24 according to european regulations, and might thus be an unwitting accomplice to money laundering, which is still a very serious offense.

[hackstutz]

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2329063/beschluss_durchsuchung_geschwaerzt.pdf


was this yet translated? in short it says his private and business rooms were searched for evidence regarding fraud.

i guess (dont know though) this means, hardware is confiscated. i hope the bitcoins are backuped elsewhere. else they will stay in some police-basement forever.

[darnth]

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2329063/beschluss_durchsuchung_geschwaerzt.pdf


was this yet translated? in short it says his private and business rooms were searched for evidence regarding fraud.

i guess (dont know though) this means, hardware is confiscated. i hope the bitcoins are backuped elsewhere. else they will stay in some police-basement forever.

Unofficial translation (reasonably accurate) by someone is here:
http://board.btc24-help.com/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=40&sid=5b69645c5a11e0e013385920684f4080

And yes, looks like his private and business rooms where searched and anything of potential worth to get info (which usually includes computers) should have been confiscated.

[philips]

The site was updated with some info.

[surebet]

we should sue THEM, not simon. yep, we should all sue the german authorities and banks who created this mess. after we are through with them they´d never touch btc accounts again.

[greyhawk]

I for one want him to try it.

[600watt]

we should sue THEM, not simon. yep, we should all sue the german authorities and banks who created this mess. after we are through with them they´d never touch btc accounts again.

+1  nice one, admittably

[MegaBrutal]

Ugh... the situation seems very bad. I see less and less chance that we'll get our BTC back, but I'm still hoping... That money could really change my life...

Someone said (can't quote, it was pages ago) he choose Bitcoin-24 when he got pissed off by Mt.Gox. Same to me. Bitcoin-24 really looked like a legitimate, quality trading site with a nice interface.

Bitcoin-24.com is the biggest bitcoin exchange in Europe and is only surpassed by MtGox in terms of EURO volume.

Also, since it had high volume, it seemed to be stable. I would have never expected it to lose my money. I can't even say that I (and others) were irresponsible or careless when they transferred funds there - or were we? I even did my research.

But then, no sites can be trusted... maybe not even Mt.Gox... If I ever get that money back, I'll store it in a paper wallet, and only expend it when I actually wanna use or trade it (even though, when there are quick moves in price, I won't be able to act quickly...). This is a HUGE problem that we can't trade bitcoins with trust.

I wish I wasn't pissed off on Mt.Gox so much and would have waited a few hours to make the decision to move to Bitcoin-24... And I shouldn't have moved ALL my Mt.Gox account balance to one place anyway...

[bitbadger]

The search warrant basically also states that they accuse him of, since sometime in March, not being willing and able to pay back all his customers deposits anymore.

the irony of that is that we the customers can't now get our deposits now because of this seizure of hardware and closure of bank accounts. Something that this seizure was apparently supposed to avoid!

So it's the banks and authorities and not Simon who are preventing us from doing what they accused Simon of preventing us from doing.

I wonder about this seizure of hardware... surely the hardware was installed in a secure area at a data centre, not located in his own business office? Couldn't be that easy to simply seize?