Bitcoin Forum
March 28, 2024, 01:51:09 PM *
News: Latest Bitcoin Core release: 26.0 [Torrent]
 
   Home   Help Search Login Register More  
Pages: « 1 2 3 [4] 5 »  All
  Print  
Author Topic: Thoughts on FBI dumping Silkroad BTC  (Read 6929 times)
T.Stuart
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 644
Merit: 500


One Token to Move Anything Anywhere


View Profile
January 04, 2014, 07:09:41 PM
 #61


that's a damn shame. electric would be nearly my last ignore, if i was so inclined. the fact is you're extrapolating things from your own personal opinions and forgetting that not everyone thinks the same way about bitcoin.


OK. Forget the "ignoring". Let's focus on the topic. Can I ask you a serious question?

Please read this first: http://techliberation.com/2014/01/02/help-me-answer-senate-committees-questions-about-bitcoin/

Would you say that the impression I got from reading this and other diverse sources of information, the impression that "the government is working out how to cater for Bitcoin's success", is "delusional"?

"the government" is not a single, monolithic entity so it's not necessarily delusional it just doesn't make much sense.

the FBI, however, if some sources are to be believed, have a specific and precedented way to deal with seized assets which will likely not be changed without due process.

OK! Thanks for your balanced response.

                                                                               
███████████████▄▄▄                     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄                     ▄█████▀
████████████████████▄                ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄                 ▄█████▀
              ▀▀█████▄             ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄             ▄█████▀
                 █████▌          ▄█████▀ ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄         ▄█████▀
                 ▐█████        ▄█████▀     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▄█████▀
                 █████▌      ▄█████▀         ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄ ▄█████▀
              ▄▄█████▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████████▀
████████████████████▀    ▄█████▀     ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▀
███████████████▀▀▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█▀
                                    ▀███████▀
                                      ▀███▀
                                        ▀
.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
.◆ ◆ ◆ ONE TOKEN TO MOVE ANYTHING ANYWHERE ◆ ◆ ◆.
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁
"Governments are good at cutting off the heads of a centrally controlled networks like Napster, but pure P2P networks like Gnutella and Tor seem to be holding their own." -- Satoshi
Advertised sites are not endorsed by the Bitcoin Forum. They may be unsafe, untrustworthy, or illegal in your jurisdiction.
BurtW
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 2646
Merit: 1129

All paid signature campaigns should be banned.


View Profile WWW
January 04, 2014, 08:41:12 PM
 #62

Don't EVER sacrifice fungubility of Bitcoin. EVER. FOR ANY REASON.
This is the most important and pretty much only point made in this thread.  An attack on the fungibility of Bitcoin is currently the only real threat to Bitcoin I see from LE, GOV or from within.

Our family was terrorized by Homeland Security.  Read all about it here:  http://www.jmwagner.com/ and http://www.burtw.com/  Any donations to help us recover from the $300,000 in legal fees and forced donations to the Federal Asset Forfeiture slush fund are greatly appreciated!
dnaleor
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 1470
Merit: 1000


Want privacy? Use Monero!


View Profile
January 04, 2014, 09:53:18 PM
 #63

Don't EVER sacrifice fungubility of Bitcoin. EVER. FOR ANY REASON.
This is the most important and pretty much only point made in this thread.  An attack on the fungibility of Bitcoin is currently the only real threat to Bitcoin I see from LE, GOV or from within.

It was just a thought experiment Wink
I like the purity of Bicoin as it is now...

But think about a world were government tries something like coinvalidation, bitcoins are stolen from the regular people for "legal" reasons,  and bitcoin taxes are collected by the government.
In that case, I think it is fair to try to invalidate the colected taxes and the deny the coin validation by hard forking Bitcoin and implement the "PureBitcoin" Smiley

We could create a list (yes, I know... This will be difficult to implement on a peer 2 peer basis) which excludes certain adresses and the coins send to those adresses are not accepted by the network and send back to the previous address.
So we create a parallel PureBitcoin where the people do not pay taxes and bitcoins are not confiscated by the government.

Naturally, the original bitoin will still exist, and an exchange rate between the 2 will be established. The market will decide which coin is preferred.
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 12:50:42 AM
 #64

http://pando.com/2014/01/02/with-130m-of-bitcoin-wealth-and-plans-to-sell-the-fbi-could-rattle-the-virtual-currency-cage/

Being a government entity you can bet on them trying everything in their power to crash the price when they unload..if for nothing else for fun of it

Kinda wondering how the FBI even got to the coins.  Encrypted wallet?  Ya know?

Standard practice is keyloggers and to arrest the person when their account is already open.  Encryption?  What encryption?  They have it in the keylogger record.

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 12:52:05 AM
 #65

How they got access to the coins will probably never be publicly known. Weak password, old unencrypted wallet-backup, deal with DPR, etc... There are various options available.

Scopolamine? Waterboarding at Guantanamo Bay?

 Wink

They're the FBI, not the CIA.  (US Citizens are treated differently than foreigners...)

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 12:55:44 AM
 #66

I doubt that FBI will sell the coins at all.. They will probably scramble the source and use the coins to fish out criminals from the tor market community or any other criminals that have started to use bitcoin in their ventures. Bitcoin properties give a nice edge to orginized crime in it's efficiency in handling value. I think that in a byrocratic perspective, it's easier to keep confiscated coins and use them as an asset, then to sell coins and buy back coins later when needed.

They may use some of the seized coins for this after auctioning in order to catch bad guys.  Of course, if I were a bad guy, I would never accept a bitcoin that could be traced back to that address.  But bad guys aren't usually smart (or they wouldn't be bad guys).

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 12:59:34 AM
 #67

I'm pretty sure they said they were going to sell the coins ..... someone can correct me if they didn't

Why? Do you think they need the money right now? Of course they won't sell. Everybody is bullish for Bitcoin this year, including the FBI! Even all the bears on this forum are bullish!  Grin

There is no way the FBI will sell any coins for at least 2 years in my opinion, and only then might they pass some to the treasury as a way to control the price.



Basically the FBI has to sell them, unless special legislation would be passed which would allow the FBI to speculate on seized assets, which makes no sense. What remains is using them for some sort of sting operation to flush out other blackmarket sites, but I don't think that is really an option since it's hard to hide where the coins come from.
Are you really that ignorant about how the world works?

Ignorant? What do you mean? Considering that the US government is working out how to cater for Bitcoin's success do you not think they would want reserves of their own? Right now there is speculation going on with fiat currencies: does that mean that the government or FBI is not allowed to hold fiat currencies?

These are different agencies that barely talk to each other.  The US government isn't as corrupt as most of you think.  They are required to auction seized assets by law.

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 01:00:44 AM
 #68

Just a thought: can`t we just hard fork bitcoin to invalidate the coins in posession of the FBI?  Grin

If you can convince 51% of the miners to screw the most powerful government on earth...  Probably not happening.

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
T.Stuart
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 644
Merit: 500


One Token to Move Anything Anywhere


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 01:02:30 AM
 #69


These are different agencies that barely talk to each other.  The US government isn't as corrupt as most of you think.  They are required to auction seized assets by law.

This is not about corruption. This is about a potentially huge game-changing financial technology arriving much faster than anyone is anticipating.

Do you honestly think they will just auction them like any old junk confiscated from criminals?

Until they feel like they understand Bitcoin properly (which could take a while) those coins will not go anywhere.

                                                                               
███████████████▄▄▄                     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄                     ▄█████▀
████████████████████▄                ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄                 ▄█████▀
              ▀▀█████▄             ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄             ▄█████▀
                 █████▌          ▄█████▀ ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄         ▄█████▀
                 ▐█████        ▄█████▀     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▄█████▀
                 █████▌      ▄█████▀         ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄ ▄█████▀
              ▄▄█████▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████████▀
████████████████████▀    ▄█████▀     ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▀
███████████████▀▀▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█▀
                                    ▀███████▀
                                      ▀███▀
                                        ▀
.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
.◆ ◆ ◆ ONE TOKEN TO MOVE ANYTHING ANYWHERE ◆ ◆ ◆.
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁
BitchicksHusband
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 378
Merit: 255


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 01:10:01 AM
 #70


These are different agencies that barely talk to each other.  The US government isn't as corrupt as most of you think.  They are required to auction seized assets by law.

This is not about corruption. This is about a potentially huge game-changing financial technology arriving much faster than anyone is anticipating.

Do you honestly think they will just auction them like any old junk confiscated from criminals?

Until they feel like they understand Bitcoin properly (which could take a while) those coins will not go anywhere.

1. US agencies generally don't conspire with each other in grand plots.  They might ask for help on a single given issue (one arrest), but they don't scheme to invent new rules.  "Hey, Senator, this is so-and-so from the FBI.  I have these coins here and we don't want to auction them.  I want you to hold a hearing with Treasury, DHS and SS and, oh yeah, make sure the SS guy is against it to make it look good.  And let's have some guy tie it to child porn for an hour just in case we need to kill it later."  <-  That didn't happen.

Yes.  I am 100% certain that they will follow the law and auction them once the trial is over.

Until the trial is over and DPR is found guilty, these coins will not go anywhere.  As soon as he is found guilty, they will be split up into lots and auctioned publicly.  I can assure you that this will happen.

1BitcHiCK1iRa6YVY6qDqC6M594RBYLNPo
T.Stuart
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 644
Merit: 500


One Token to Move Anything Anywhere


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 01:15:56 AM
 #71


These are different agencies that barely talk to each other.  The US government isn't as corrupt as most of you think.  They are required to auction seized assets by law.

This is not about corruption. This is about a potentially huge game-changing financial technology arriving much faster than anyone is anticipating.

Do you honestly think they will just auction them like any old junk confiscated from criminals?

Until they feel like they understand Bitcoin properly (which could take a while) those coins will not go anywhere.

1. US agencies generally don't conspire with each other in grand plots.  They might ask for help on a single given issue (one arrest), but they don't scheme to invent new rules.  "Hey, Senator, this is so-and-so from the FBI.  I have these coins here and we don't want to auction them.  I want you to hold a hearing with Treasury, DHS and SS and, oh yeah, make sure the SS guy is against it to make it look good.  And let's have some guy tie it to child porn for an hour just in case we need to kill it later."  <-  That didn't happen.

Yes.  I am 100% certain that they will follow the law and auction them once the trial is over.

Until the trial is over and DPR is found guilty, these coins will not go anywhere.  As soon as he is found guilty, they will be split up into lots and auctioned publicly.  I can assure you that this will happen.

But what are Bitcoins? What is the value of a Bitcoin? Is Bitcoin a currency? Tell me, do the FBI auction currency when they confiscate it? What do they do with US dollars?

What if the government decides to classify Bitcoin as a currency? What if the US government classifies Bitcoin as an asset but the Swiss government a currency? I really don't think that the solution to the FBI's coins is going to be as straightforward as you think.

                                                                               
███████████████▄▄▄                     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄                     ▄█████▀
████████████████████▄                ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄                 ▄█████▀
              ▀▀█████▄             ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄             ▄█████▀
                 █████▌          ▄█████▀ ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄         ▄█████▀
                 ▐█████        ▄█████▀     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▄█████▀
                 █████▌      ▄█████▀         ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄ ▄█████▀
              ▄▄█████▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████████▀
████████████████████▀    ▄█████▀     ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▀
███████████████▀▀▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█▀
                                    ▀███████▀
                                      ▀███▀
                                        ▀
.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
.◆ ◆ ◆ ONE TOKEN TO MOVE ANYTHING ANYWHERE ◆ ◆ ◆.
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁
wachtwoord
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 2324
Merit: 1125


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 01:25:00 AM
 #72

Don't EVER sacrifice fungubility of Bitcoin. EVER. FOR ANY REASON.
This is the most important and pretty much only point made in this thread.  An attack on the fungibility of Bitcoin is currently the only real threat to Bitcoin I see from LE, GOV or from within.

It was just a thought experiment Wink
I like the purity of Bicoin as it is now...

But think about a world were government tries something like coinvalidation, bitcoins are stolen from the regular people for "legal" reasons,  and bitcoin taxes are collected by the government.
In that case, I think it is fair to try to invalidate the colected taxes and the deny the coin validation by hard forking Bitcoin and implement the "PureBitcoin" Smiley

We could create a list (yes, I know... This will be difficult to implement on a peer 2 peer basis) which excludes certain adresses and the coins send to those adresses are not accepted by the network and send back to the previous address.
So we create a parallel PureBitcoin where the people do not pay taxes and bitcoins are not confiscated by the government.

Naturally, the original bitoin will still exist, and an exchange rate between the 2 will be established. The market will decide which coin is preferred.

No, creating a list leads to centralization and a weak point.
BurtW
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 2646
Merit: 1129

All paid signature campaigns should be banned.


View Profile WWW
January 05, 2014, 02:17:02 AM
 #73

The FBI will not care what "Bit coins" are.  They will follow protocol.  They will find out what they are worth when then sell them at public auction.  That is what they do. 

Our family was terrorized by Homeland Security.  Read all about it here:  http://www.jmwagner.com/ and http://www.burtw.com/  Any donations to help us recover from the $300,000 in legal fees and forced donations to the Federal Asset Forfeiture slush fund are greatly appreciated!
T.Stuart
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 644
Merit: 500


One Token to Move Anything Anywhere


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 02:22:33 AM
 #74

The FBI will not care what "Bit coins" are.  They will follow protocol.  They will find out what they are worth when then sell them at public auction.  That is what they do. 

Can you answer the currency question?

                                                                               
███████████████▄▄▄                     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄                     ▄█████▀
████████████████████▄                ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄                 ▄█████▀
              ▀▀█████▄             ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄             ▄█████▀
                 █████▌          ▄█████▀ ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄         ▄█████▀
                 ▐█████        ▄█████▀     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▄█████▀
                 █████▌      ▄█████▀         ▀█████▄     ▀█████▄ ▄█████▀
              ▄▄█████▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████████▀
████████████████████▀    ▄█████▀     ▄█████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█████▀
███████████████▀▀▀     ▄█████▀     ▄█████████▄     ▀█████▄     ▀█▀
                                    ▀███████▀
                                      ▀███▀
                                        ▀
.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
.◆ ◆ ◆ ONE TOKEN TO MOVE ANYTHING ANYWHERE ◆ ◆ ◆.
▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁
BurtW
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 2646
Merit: 1129

All paid signature campaigns should be banned.


View Profile WWW
January 05, 2014, 02:28:20 AM
 #75

Sure.  If they can deposit it at their bank and convert it to USD directly they will do that otherwise they will auction them off.  If they confiscate pesos they just deposit them.  If they confiscate gold they auction it off.  It will depend on the situation two or so years from now.

Our family was terrorized by Homeland Security.  Read all about it here:  http://www.jmwagner.com/ and http://www.burtw.com/  Any donations to help us recover from the $300,000 in legal fees and forced donations to the Federal Asset Forfeiture slush fund are greatly appreciated!
empoweoqwj
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 518
Merit: 500


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 03:01:12 AM
 #76

I think it's pretty clear that they got a hold of the coins as a result of a deal with DPR. He was stupid enough to get caught doing something illegal, but I don't think he was stupid enough to not properly encrypt his wallet.

If I was him, I'd be scrambling to make all the deals I could to avoid spending the next 40 years in prison.

I Just read this article:

http://www.coindesk.com/fbi-proves-seizing-bitcoins-isnt-owning/

Seems they probably don't have his encrypted wallet at the moment. Like you say, that's a great bargaining chip!
gogxmagog
Legendary
*
Offline Offline

Activity: 1456
Merit: 1009

Ad maiora!


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 04:09:33 AM
 #77

what if they treat the BTC like seized drugs? just delete his wallet and wipe his hard drive? I don't actually think this will happen, but since BTC is in regulatory limbo (kinda) I can't see the FBI doing much more than leaving it in cold storage. Why would they participate in a "grey" economy? especially when they know the whole BTC community is watching very closely.
anyhoo, they have to convict DPR first. Then figure out how to actually use BTC, which I'm guessing they are relatively clueless about still. which could lead us back to deletion of wallet (only by accident this time, lol)
I would actually LOVE to see the FBI accidentally delete all those BTC.
Krellan
Member
**
Offline Offline

Activity: 106
Merit: 10


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 06:41:46 AM
 #78

I think the FBI will keep it, especially if the trial leads to a conviction ("drug money" and other seized assets are kept by the government upon conviction, providing a nice revenue stream that many say leads to overzealous enforcement of drug laws when the local police agency is feeling a little poor).

It could provide the USA with a storehouse of Bitcoin, in much the same way as Fort Knox provides a storehouse of physical gold.  If Bitcoin takes off in the future and becomes more widely accepted, this could prove quite useful to the government as an asset.

1JUZr4TZ5zuB4WdEv4mrhZMaM7yttpJvLG Smiley
empoweoqwj
Hero Member
*****
Offline Offline

Activity: 518
Merit: 500


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 06:53:54 AM
 #79

I think the FBI will keep it, especially if the trial leads to a conviction ("drug money" and other seized assets are kept by the government upon conviction, providing a nice revenue stream that many say leads to overzealous enforcement of drug laws when the local police agency is feeling a little poor).

It could provide the USA with a storehouse of Bitcoin, in much the same way as Fort Knox provides a storehouse of physical gold.  If Bitcoin takes off in the future and becomes more widely accepted, this could prove quite useful to the government as an asset.


From the coindesk article:

"The FBI has told Forbes that they will sell their bitcoin holdings after Ulbricht’s trial."
arepo
Sr. Member
****
Offline Offline

Activity: 448
Merit: 250


this statement is false


View Profile
January 05, 2014, 06:56:13 AM
 #80

I think the FBI will keep it, especially if the trial leads to a conviction ("drug money" and other seized assets are kept by the government upon conviction, providing a nice revenue stream that many say leads to overzealous enforcement of drug laws when the local police agency is feeling a little poor).

It could provide the USA with a storehouse of Bitcoin, in much the same way as Fort Knox provides a storehouse of physical gold.  If Bitcoin takes off in the future and becomes more widely accepted, this could prove quite useful to the government as an asset.


From the coindesk article:

"The FBI has told Forbes that they will sell their bitcoin holdings after Ulbricht’s trial."

thank you. the likely outcome of this issue is mainly resolved. the other discussion in this thread is worthwhile but speculating on the FBI's actions is futile at this point.

this sentence has fifteen words, seventy-four letters, four commas, one hyphen, and a period.
18N9md2G1oA89kdBuiyJFrtJShuL5iDWDz
Pages: « 1 2 3 [4] 5 »  All
  Print  
 
Jump to:  

Powered by MySQL Powered by PHP Powered by SMF 1.1.19 | SMF © 2006-2009, Simple Machines Valid XHTML 1.0! Valid CSS!