Localbitcoins now requires identification

[magneto]

So we all knew that LBC was already going down the path of forced verification for advertisers, and they made the move that all advertisers will have to verify themselves before they can trade back in January.. And then later there was a warning for all people who had a high trade volume and "recommended" that they verify their identity. But I never expected them to actually restrict somewhat high volume traders so fast, since I was greeted with this message:

You need to verify your identity before you can continue trading. Proceed to verify your identity

I mean, you could still create new accounts and trade from them anonymously, but it's a tedious process to go through email and phone verification all the time. And a lot of offers won't be available to you because of the fact that you can't consistently trade up for a good reputation.

Time to move to a new p2p trading platform?

[TheQuin]

Is there any announcement to go with that? I'm wondering if that affects all accounts if it is just trades over a certain amount or in specific countries.

[nc50lc]

I'm always expecting that LBC will require KYC verification soon.
Yes it's P2P but still a "widely known" trading platform,
regulators wont tolerate any crypto in their sights that has the potential to become a hidden sub-black-market trading ground

Time to move to a new p2p trading platform?

I never used LBC since it isn't available in our Country but we have local exchanges and
3rd party trading service providers that requires KYC verification even before this KYC "issue" became a Bitcoin-users' issue,
and I didn't have any problem with that (In my case).

If you wanted to trade Peer-to-peer anonymously, use other "methods".

[TryNinja]

Is there any announcement to go with that? I'm wondering if that affects all accounts if it is just trades over a certain amount or in specific countries.

This:

Yes the guide is currently missing the ID verification requirement.

A few months back we started requiring all users to be ID verified before they can create an advertisement.

https://www.reddit.com/r/localbitcoins/comments/8bzx00/identification_required_for_advertising/dxfw3d3/

But it looks like you also need to verify your account with ID if you have been trading a lot.

"Your trade volume has been significant in the past 12 months. Please, verify your ID to continue trading" WTF?

https://www.reddit.com/r/localbitcoins/comments/8abtct/your_trade_volume_has_been_significant_in_the/

[TheQuin]

Do you know what amount they consider to be "significant in the past 12 months"?

I verified my account ages ago so it doesn't affect me directly but I'm just curious.

[TryNinja]

Do you know what amount they consider to be "significant in the past 12 months"?

I verified my account ages ago so it doesn't affect me directly but I'm just curious.

No. Looks like no one from Localbitcoins has actually commented about this new "limits".

[piloder]

I think this is more related to decrease the growing fud over p2p crypto exchange with reversible payment methods. Don't know whether or not LBC will cooperate with law enforcement in case of scam but giving your identity to third party like LBC is quite risky. There is no point in using LBC instead of your local trading platform if they will make verification as mandatory requirement..

[Lanatsa]

I think this is more related to decrease the growing fud over p2p crypto exchange with reversible payment methods. Don't know whether or not LBC will cooperate with law enforcement in case of scam but giving your identity to third party like LBC is quite risky. There is no point in using LBC instead of your local trading platform if they will make verification as mandatory requirement..

The choices will be just the same where most users don't have any choice but to comply on what have been asked. If they would decide to leave LBC and go to traditional exchangers they would still need to comply KYC and now LBC do ask it also which means you don't have anymore ways to make yourself truly anonymous but somehow this thing or problem would be faced for those who do make transactions way beyond limits.

[LeGaulois]

I think this is more related to decrease the growing fud over p2p crypto exchange with reversible payment methods. Don't know whether or not LBC will cooperate with law enforcement in case of scam but giving your identity to third party like LBC is quite risky. There is no point in using LBC instead of your local trading platform if they will make verification as mandatory requirement..

The choices will be just the same where most users don't have any choice but to comply on what have been asked. If they would decide to leave LBC and go to traditional exchangers they would still need to comply KYC and now LBC do ask it also which means you don't have anymore ways to make yourself truly anonymous but somehow this thing or problem would be faced for those who do make transactions way beyond limits.

It's not true, you can still trade anonymously it's just that people are lazy to search or want to find the cheaper, or don't want to spend 30 minutes to learn. People want the spoon in the mouth directly
It's not so difficult to keep your privacy and to avoid the usual KYC process..

[squatz1]

Was bound to happen at some point, it was only a matter of time until the regulators came in and wanted their fair share of what was going on. They're going to want companies to keep the names of people so they're able to at some point tax people on what they're buying.

Sadly, the only thing people want to do is change companies -- which once the next company becomes big enough then they're going to force them into kyc. Who even knows if P2P could work with something like this.

[St4yInTh3D4rk]

So we all knew that LBC was already going down the path of forced verification for advertisers, and they made the move that all advertisers will have to verify themselves before they can trade back in January.. And then later there was a warning for all people who had a high trade volume and "recommended" that they verify their identity. But I never expected them to actually restrict somewhat high volume traders so fast, since I was greeted with this message:

You need to verify your identity before you can continue trading. Proceed to verify your identity

I mean, you could still create new accounts and trade from them anonymously, but it's a tedious process to go through email and phone verification all the time. And a lot of offers won't be available to you because of the fact that you can't consistently trade up for a good reputation.

Time to move to a new p2p trading platform?

And one more the traders are also asking for our ID to verify to the people who are selling bitcoins to them but most of the people are not confortable with these activities but what we can do it is their terms so we need to agree if we want to continue.

So don't sell any bitcoins anymore just hold it forever.

[Mister1k]

So we all knew that LBC was already going down the path of forced verification for advertisers, and they made the move that all advertisers will have to verify themselves before they can trade back in January.. And then later there was a warning for all people who had a high trade volume and "recommended" that they verify their identity. But I never expected them to actually restrict somewhat high volume traders so fast, since I was greeted with this message:

You need to verify your identity before you can continue trading. Proceed to verify your identity

I mean, you could still create new accounts and trade from them anonymously, but it's a tedious process to go through email and phone verification all the time. And a lot of offers won't be available to you because of the fact that you can't consistently trade up for a good reputation.

Time to move to a new p2p trading platform?

This does not like true information, I have been using the localbitcoins more than 3 years but still there is nothing has been asked from the localbitcoins site. If the trader have policy to trade along with ID verification means you need to go ahead with the Id card verification which is internationally accepted. That is how LBC policy works so far mate.
If the furnished information is true. First share the policy image which shows the details you mentioned.

[ManaMan]

I think this is more related to decrease the growing fud over p2p crypto exchange with reversible payment methods. Don't know whether or not LBC will cooperate with law enforcement in case of scam but giving your identity to third party like LBC is quite risky. There is no point in using LBC instead of your local trading platform if they will make verification as mandatory requirement..

True, if you don't need cash in hand it's far better to do KYC with well known exchange where you can even get better trades. LBC offered no verification needed and was nice place to go there even if rates where higher still it was comfortable to do trades. Seems they won't require from all users to verify if I understood well but this is indications that verification might be applied to all users in the future. Well they must have good reasons for doing this as well.

And one more the traders are also asking for our ID to verify to the people who are selling bitcoins to them but most of the people are not confortable with these activities but what we can do it is their terms so we need to agree if we want to continue.

So don't sell any bitcoins anymore just hold it forever.

Traders are doing this for the higher risky methods such as buying and selling with PayPal and such services where there is high risk involved. But yes if we want it to continue best is to follow up their requirements or else find another place.

[MiF]

Well, its about time. it will be a welcome development in time to come. Though, I still prefer the anonymous transaction system one gets when trading in localbitcoin but with the much fraud and scamming activities going on there, KYC might help reduce it to some extent. I just hope whatever  method they will be using won't be a tedious one and won't require much information apart from the phone and email verification.

That's a good ways to monitor bitcoin transactions at your local area, and as the development go further it will secure the funds of every user. All criminal can be tracked down because of the legitimate identification of every customers doing transactions peer to peer. However if all countries will be doing this, I think no more fraudsters will be able to be confident of doing such crimes like stealing money from other people through localbitcoins exchanges.

[Kemarit]

I'm always expecting that LBC will require KYC verification soon.
Yes it's P2P but still a "widely known" trading platform,
regulators wont tolerate any crypto in their sights that has the potential to become a hidden sub-black-market trading ground

Time to move to a new p2p trading platform?

I never used LBC since it isn't available in our Country but we have a local exchanges and
3rd party trading service providers that requires KYC verification even before this KYC "issue" became a Bitcoin-users' issue,
and I didn't have any problem with that (In my case).

If you wanted to trade Peer-to-peer anonymously, use other "methods".

As far as I know LBC is available in the Philippines as well. (https://localbitcoins.com/country/PH). But yes, since there is a local exchanges like coins.ph, not everyone knows that there also a lot of trading done in LBC Philippines.

Was bound to happen at some point, it was only a matter of time until the regulators came in and wanted their fair share of what was going on. They're going to want companies to keep the names of people so they're able to at some point tax people on what they're buying.

~snip~

Of course, just a matter of time, but I was quite surprise by the immediate action by LBC. Maybe they are really under the scrutiny as of late, and they can't do anything but to succumb to government's pressure to put KYC and verification. I don't know if there is a alternative to LBC though, there might be one out there but I'm sure it will take the same path when government take notice of it.

[sheenshane]

As far as I know LBC is available in the Philippines as well. (https://localbitcoins.com/country/PH). But yes, since there is a local exchanges like coins.ph, not everyone knows that there also a lot of trading done in LBC Philippines.

Yes, LocalBitcoin.com was here in the Philippines but mostly people well known was using a Coins.ph exchange it is easy for us to convert our bitcoin to fiat or paying bills and having a prepaid load for an instant, I think that's the reason why they must choose this exchange rather than LBC.
Well, that is expected that LBC having also KYC like Coins.ph, to have security in making a transaction or not having a transaction on illegal activities. Nowadays you can't be hidden on blockchain transaction or still anonymous, make a transaction that identifies in real you.

[milewilda]

I think this is more related to decrease the growing fud over p2p crypto exchange with reversible payment methods. Don't know whether or not LBC will cooperate with law enforcement in case of scam but giving your identity to third party like LBC is quite risky. There is no point in using LBC instead of your local trading platform if they will make verification as mandatory requirement..

The choices will be just the same where most users don't have any choice but to comply on what have been asked. If they would decide to leave LBC and go to traditional exchangers they would still need to comply KYC and now LBC do ask it also which means you don't have anymore ways to make yourself truly anonymous but somehow this thing or problem would be faced for those who do make transactions way beyond limits.

It's not true, you can still trade anonymously it's just that people are lazy to search or want to find the cheaper, or don't want to spend 30 minutes to learn. People want the spoon in the mouth directly
It's not so difficult to keep your privacy and to avoid the usual KYC process..

This is true which the things you do said was right.People do really love on being spoonfeed where they dont really bother theirselves on searching up other things and as you said there are lots of ways to remain anonymous without the need of complying such thing being asked on kyc. They are not just making a move or doing good search on possible ways.

[magneto]

Do you know what amount they consider to be "significant in the past 12 months"?

I verified my account ages ago so it doesn't affect me directly but I'm just curious.

No idea, but I didn't even trade that much over the past 12 months. I believe that my trading volume fell under the 2-5 BTC category, and I'd say that half of it incurred while BTC was still relatively cheap back in the first half of 2017.

I don't think that's that significant by any means, but I doubt that LBC wanted to do this either. Obviously doesn't make sense for them to do this voluntarily, and there had to be some sort of regulatory pressure be put on them.

This does not like true information, I have been using the localbitcoins more than 3 years but still there is nothing has been asked from the localbitcoins site. If the trader have policy to trade along with ID verification means you need to go ahead with the Id card verification which is internationally accepted. That is how LBC policy works so far mate.
If the furnished information is true. First share the policy image which shows the details you mentioned.

Search on the web. I'm sure you'll find a lot more cases. I wouldn't lie to the whole community for the sake of discrediting LBC, which was one of my favorite platforms to trade on.

Anyways, after a few days this suspension doesn't seem to be going. Time to move on.

[TheQuin]

No idea, but I didn't even trade that much over the past 12 months. I believe that my trading volume fell under the 2-5 BTC category, and I'd say that half of it incurred while BTC was still relatively cheap back in the first half of 2017.

I don't think that's that significant by any means, but I doubt that LBC wanted to do this either. Obviously doesn't make sense for them to do this voluntarily, and there had to be some sort of regulatory pressure be put on them.

That's what I was thinking. It makes me wonder if this has been applied everywhere or just in some countries where that pressure is coming from.

[timerland]

I haven't gotten any sort of notifications yet, probably because of the fact that my trade volume is still too low for them to consider my account worthwhile to suspend. It seems to have started to happen gradually, over the past few weeks as more and more accounts have been placed into restriction.

The only reason I use LBC right now is because of the fact that it doesn't require identification. If I'm forced into giving away my personal details, I'm definitely going to find somewhere else to trade.

No idea, but I didn't even trade that much over the past 12 months. I believe that my trading volume fell under the 2-5 BTC category, and I'd say that half of it incurred while BTC was still relatively cheap back in the first half of 2017.

I don't think that's that significant by any means, but I doubt that LBC wanted to do this either. Obviously doesn't make sense for them to do this voluntarily, and there had to be some sort of regulatory pressure be put on them.

That's what I was thinking. It makes me wonder if this has been applied everywhere or just in some countries where that pressure is coming from.

It could definitely be possible. The amount of info regarding these new rules released by LBC is next to none (or at least I haven't been looking in the right places). Perhaps it's only a region thing, but everyone seemed to have gotten warnings that had significant trading volume, if not a ban (who is not already verified).