Is this possible in India?

[Guvn0r]

On March 19, chilean banks started closing bank accounts of major cryptocurrency exchanges in the country. First in the line were Itau Corpbanca and Scotiabank followed by Banco del Estado de Chile only a week later.

Now, the exchanges in question gathered to fight back, legally. According to Bloomberg report, three exchanges hit by the ban, BUDA, Orionx and CryptoMarket have jointly appealed the bank decisions, that essentially ended their platforms.

Crypto community in Chile also joined the battle and try to help the exchanges with a Twitter action under a hashtag #ChileQuiereCryptos. It is obvious that people in this Southamerican country want to have an option of trading cryptocurrencies.

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P.S. I am no expert of law, just wondering if something like this is possible in India too? If yes, Why wouldn't exchanges give it a try?

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[botany]

Tough - In the case of Chile, it was banks who were taking action unilaterally. In India’s case, action has come from a central bank directive. It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

[RocketSingh]

P.S. I am no expert of law, just wondering if something like this is possible in India too? If yes, Why wouldn't exchanges give it a try?

A PIL is already underway.

Details: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/16XcNPYI-86gMThhQK2qi0hLc_mHClGNGD41AVa5t3Ko/viewform?edit_requested=true

Follow: https://twitter.com/Blockchainlaw91

[achris]

Why

It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

The Supreme Court directive to RBI to issue warnings against Cryptos were actually initiated by a PIL by an individual. ( 2017 Nov )
Similarly a PIL can also move the SC to revoke the "ban" by RBI on banking agencies ( Banks) to stop dealing with crypto currency service providers.
If all the exchanges club together and file the petition ( rather than any online petition gimmicks etc ) , it is very much possible.

Remember , the central bank is just another bank with board of directors appointed by the central Govt.

Tough - In the case of Chile, it was banks who were taking action unilaterally. In India’s case, action has come from a central bank directive. It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

[Guvn0r]

We have almost 10 weeks (according to the RBI circular) until every bank stops supporting exchanges. I ve just today received a mail from Koinex that they have changed their banking partners. I still hope against all odds that something positive might happen if a very large number of people decide to take action in anyway possible. I have signed the PIL and will forward to all my cryptobuddies.

[Clement Kaliyar]

Tough - In the case of Chile, it was banks who were taking action unilaterally. In India’s case, action has come from a central bank directive. It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

It should be possible, India is a democratic country and people should have the voice because we put them in those position to provide us the best solution and not the other way around, if they do not have the intelligence to sort out a way to legalize the new market they have to sort help from experts in the field rather than shutting down the entire system.

[botany]

Remember , the central bank is just another bank with board of directors appointed by the central Govt.

The central bank is not just another bank. It is the regulator of banks.

It should be possible, India is a democratic country and people should have the voice because we put them in those position to provide us the best solution and not the other way around, if they do not have the intelligence to sort out a way to legalize the new market they have to sort help from experts in the field rather than shutting down the entire system.

Who are the 'people' that you are talking about? A very, very, small proportion of the population will be inconvenienced by this move of RBI. You will have to be practical - the RBI does not need to foster innovation. It is more concerned about maintaining financial stability. Acting now against cryptocurrency exchanges is the less risky option for RBI - which it has done.

[achris]

Remember , the central bank is just another bank with board of directors appointed by the central Govt.

The central bank is not just another bank. It is the regulator of banks.

Oh Okay.

[amishmanish]

I ve just today received a mail from Koinex that they have changed their banking partners.

Change of bankers wouldn't matter in 10 weeks I guess. Although, What about international banks and using wire transfers. We were already paying the forex premium over international prices on Zebpay etc.
If an Indian entity decided to shift base to say, Singapore and use a bank there, Would RBI mandate still apply on them? I don't think so.

Who are the 'people' that you are talking about? A very, very, small proportion of the population will be inconvenienced by this move of RBI. You will have to be practical - the RBI does not need to foster innovation. It is more concerned about maintaining financial stability. Acting now against cryptocurrency exchanges is the less risky option for RBI - which it has done.

LOL..You maybe right but this isn't so simple. The number of people who got into cryptocurrency via the forum or for a long time maybe few in numbers but the hordes that came in wanting to 10X their investment and bought Ripple and Tron should be a considerable number.

This petition should be spreading through word of mouth to those people. I bet they'll rally to keep the golden goose alive.

[Guvn0r]

Amazon filed a patent to de-anonymize Bitcoin transactions and sell the data to law enforcement

News link here

Just saw this at r/bitcoin. I don't know exactly if this is good/bad for the crypto community. But I guess, if the data is sold or given only to law enforcement that should be a great reason for Govt. to stop worrying about how 'BTC would be used for illegal purposes'.

[RameshSekar111]

Indian politicians and officers don't want to include innovative technology in their domain and restrict all of us to stop using cryptocoin because they don't know about them.
India is the only democratic country where anything can happen against the will of people.

[amishmanish]

Amazon filed a patent to de-anonymize Bitcoin transactions and sell the data to law enforcement

News link here

Just saw this at r/bitcoin. I don't know exactly if this is good/bad for the crypto community. But I guess, if the data is sold or given only to law enforcement that should be a great reason for Govt. to stop worrying about how 'BTC would be used for illegal purposes'.

The patent application reads:

The raw transaction data may have little meaning to a customer unless the customer has a way to correlate various elements of the stream with other useful data

How is this not a form of surveillance of data? And looks like they have been awarded the patent too...

They are narrowing down the search domain for consumers making crypto payments. This would allow them to make better sense of who is buying what. The kind of thing that amazon already does for their "suggested for you" sections.
The burden to maintain anonymity while making such transactions (by removing any direct references and using VPN for IP) will be on the consumer.

[achris]

Amazon filed a patent to de-anonymize Bitcoin transactions and sell the data to law enforcement

News link here

Just saw this at r/bitcoin. I don't know exactly if this is good/bad for the crypto community. But I guess, if the data is sold or given only to law enforcement that should be a great reason for Govt. to stop worrying about how 'BTC would be used for illegal purposes'.

The patent application reads:

The raw transaction data may have little meaning to a customer unless the customer has a way to correlate various elements of the stream with other useful data

How is this not a form of surveillance of data? And looks likem/2018/04/18/amazon-wins-patent-for-data-feed-marketplace.html] they have been awarded the patent too...

They are narrowing down the search domain for consumers making crypto payments. This would allow them to make better sense of who is buying what. The kind of thing that amazon already does for their "suggested for you" sections.
The burden to maintain anonymity while making such transactions (by removing any direct references and using VPN for IP) will be on the consumer.

This is definitely not good.  It undermines the basic tenets of crypto currency ideologies.

But similar data 'sells' have been rampant in the past too.
Airtel ad other telcos have been doing this for years in India - without any formal consent from the consumer.
Airtel sells the bill payment patterns to NBFCs to build their financial risk models for consumers based in rural/sub-urban localities ( due to the lack of other consumer data). Based on their telephone/mobile bill payment patterns , the NBFCs can gauge the riskiness of a customer with respect to loan disbursements .

As far as amazon US is concerned, the patent is a formal way or recognizing it as a law.  In India, it is possibly a sandbox.
This will only be possible if ISPs and third party vendors  ( where you transact using bitcoins ) sell the IP addresses linked to each btc transaction. ( which they would easily do )

Having said that, this is disturbing . A few steps towards avoiding this from the users side would be
1. To always shuffle the bitcoin address for all transactions
2. Use a VPN/ be behind a proxy server.
3. Avoid transactions that are linked to a physical address . ( avoiding delivery of goods to a location )
4. Needless to say , avoid transactions which are linked to personally identifiable information  (PII) , like PAN, bank account etc
5. In case of buying coupons/goods Try using transactions which give you the option of going to the store in person and physically collecting the goods.

[amishmanish]

--snip--
Airtel ad other telcos have been doing this for years in India - without any formal consent from the consumer.
Airtel sells the bill payment patterns to NBFCs to build their financial risk models for consumers based in rural/sub-urban localities ( due to the lack of other consumer data). Based on their telephone/mobile bill payment patterns , the NBFCs can gauge the riskiness of a customer with respect to loan disbursements .

This is interesting. I got this old link where Airtel planned to get into insurance and mutual funds. Where did you get the source about selling data to NBFC's for credit scoring. It's quite possible.
It's funny how the poorest have to struggle for loan of a few thousand rupees while the rich get huge loans on the basis of simply their connections. The recent exposes, especially the one with Chanda Kochar are damning and shameful.

Having said that, this is disturbing . A few steps towards avoiding this from the users side would be
1. To always shuffle the bitcoin address for all transactions
2. Use a VPN/ be behind a proxy server.
3. Avoid transactions that are linked to a physical address . ( avoiding delivery of goods to a location )
4. Needless to say , avoid transactions which are linked to personally identifiable information  (PII) , like PAN, bank account etc
5. In case of buying coupons/goods Try using transactions which give you the option of going to the store in person and physically collecting the goods.

Nice points there. What exactly do you mean by the Point no. 3 there?? If you order something through, say, purse.io, you do need an address. Or are you suggesting this in terms of p2p trades??

[deepakg2m]

Tough - In the case of Chile, it was banks who were taking action unilaterally. In India’s case, action has come from a central bank directive. It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

I agree with you completely . In  India , it is very tough to go against the decisions of Reserved Bank of India [RBI] and i do not think that any exchange ,if banned , would even try to go to courts.

[achris]

Where did you get the source about selling data to NBFC's for credit scoring. It's quite possible.

If you search for "credit-risk models for the unbanked telecom repayment data india" or something similar to that , you will find enough links to this practice.
Excerpt from one of the sites .
"....using increased computing power and new sources of information and data (including mobile-phone usage patterns, utility-bill payment history, and others) to build better risk models. With these assets, and with scrupulous attention to privacy laws and customer consent and preferences, banks, retailers, utilities, and telecommunications providers can make responsible lending decisions in low-touch and low-cost ways."

I know people who have worked for an NBFC in the past making risk models who have used such data in their credit-risk models. Airtel was one of their prominent data partners. Cant give you more details though.
Take away - Next time you take a mobile connection, read the fine print. - especially about data sharing.

Nice points there. What exactly do you mean by the Point no. 3 there?? If you order something through, say, purse.io, you do need an address. Or are you suggesting this in terms of p2p trades??

Any direct transaction of bitcoin to get gift coupons (* like the few we have in US ( egifter.com , gyft.com , jmbullion.com ) and the ones in india *site removed* ) and the numerous other e-com sites which allow btc payments are direct pointers to link your physical address to the fact that you used bitcoins for transaction  ( and also to your bitcoin address and therefore your transaction history - if you dont shuffle your BTC address ( point #1 ). If amazon buys this data from the third party ( and surely they have the money to do so ) , they can easily build a network of well ascertained data streams to point to all ( or atleast most of  the btc transactions )

purse.io is more indirect since amazon cannot know if the amazon gift card used ( by buyer A ) to send the consignment to ( spender B) was acquired by a bitcoin or not ( unless purse sells the data to amazon or their kinds )

I have been interested for quite sometime about the IRA trying to traceback all the bitcoin transactions - and link to people - for taxation of their hoildings. Iam pretty sure the RBI and the IT department would definitely get the ecom sites in india to divulge the data to them for the purposes of linking all transactions to people - under the guise of Anti-Money Laundering act ( 2002) . And there would be no commercial organization ( or ecom site ) that would hesitate in sharing the data.

Take away - There fore, in a nut shell , if you link your purchases to a physical address, they can get you.

This is interesting. I got this old link where Airtel planned to get into insurance and mutual funds. Where did you get the source about selling data to NBFC's for credit scoring. It's quite possible.
It's funny how the poorest have to struggle for loan of a few thousand rupees while the rich get huge loans on the basis of simply their connections. The recent exposes, especially the one with Chanda Kochar are damning and shameful.
Nice points there. What exactly do you mean by the Point no. 3 there?? If you order something through, say, purse.io, you do need an address. Or are you suggesting this in terms of p2p trades??

[Guvn0r]

Looks like it is possible in India 

India: Delhi High Court Seeks Response From Central Bank On Recent Crypto Ban, Report Says

The High Court of Delhi has reportedly issued a notice to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Ministry of Finance, and the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council alleging that RBI’s decision to end dealings with crypto businesses violates the constitution, local news outlet Times of India reports today, April 22.

The High Court’s notice is reportedly in response to a claim filed by crypto company Kali Digital last week. After the RBI released a circular on April 5 stating that they would no longer provide services to a person or a business that deals in cryptocurrency, an online petition to reverse the ban was started, gaining over 43,000 signatures by press time.

Read More

Big salute to CoinRecoil Exchange (Kali Digital) - report says the exchange is going to be launched in August 2018.

Here is the official claim which have been filed.

[achris]

Looks like it is possible in India 

India: Delhi High Court Seeks Response From Central Bank On Recent Crypto Ban, Report Says

The High Court of Delhi has reportedly issued a notice to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Ministry of Finance, and the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council alleging that RBI’s decision to end dealings with crypto businesses violates the constitution, local news outlet Times of India reports today, April 22.

The High Court’s notice is reportedly in response to a claim filed by crypto company Kali Digital last week. After the RBI released a circular on April 5 stating that they would no longer provide services to a person or a business that deals in cryptocurrency, an online petition to reverse the ban was started, gaining over 43,000 signatures by press time.

Read More

Big salute to CoinRecoil Exchange (Kali Digital) - report says the exchange is going to be launched in August 2018.

Here is the official claim which have been filed.

Some good news , though its just a ray of hope . I hope it takes some force and goes ahead ... !

[bright07]

Tough - In the case of Chile, it was banks who were taking action unilaterally. In India’s case, action has come from a central bank directive. It would be tough to go the courts and argue against the actions of the RBI.

We also think the same. We can't go outside RBI's rules. But no exchange wants it to get banned and to appeal to the government for running it.