The possibility to trace Bitcoin transactions.

[Etrilicious]

A Story i saw on the net got me thinking  when Cryptocurrency becomes well known worldwide and its generally accepted, can transactions be traced or tracked
A South African teenager was found Thursday four days after he was kidnapped by a gang who demanded a ransom in bitcoin cryptocurrency worth about $123,000 (105,000 euros), police said.

Police declined to say if any ransom had been paid after the 13-year-old boy was taken in the eastern province of Mpumalanga while playing near his home and driven away in a car.

Local media published a ransom note left at the scene demanding 15 bitcoins and giving an address for a bitcoin “wallet” — an internet location where the virtual currency can be stashed.... Etc you get the point.

[lx001]

People do not think with their head, one of the easiest ways to make yourself a target is to join airdrops with your primary wallet address and e-mail. After that just copy-paste the e-mail address into Facebook and in many cases you now know everything about the guy, where he lives, and how much money he has. Some idiots will send their documents with proof-of-address for a $5 airdrop.

[WalkerIVIV]

A Story i saw on the net got me thinking  when Cryptocurrency becomes well known worldwide and its generally accepted, can transactions be traced or tracked
A South African teenager was found Thursday four days after he was kidnapped by a gang who demanded a ransom in bitcoin cryptocurrency worth about $123,000 (105,000 euros), police said.

Police declined to say if any ransom had been paid after the 13-year-old boy was taken in the eastern province of Mpumalanga while playing near his home and driven away in a car.

Local media published a ransom note left at the scene demanding 15 bitcoins and giving an address for a bitcoin “wallet” — an internet location where the virtual currency can be stashed.... Etc you get the point.

If the bitcoin will be registered on the exchange site and it will be so easy to be traced by the way. But i remember the bitcoin is psudonymous but it's a bit difficult to trace. It looks like the a gang was giving their personal address and it can be traced so easily.

[Agozyen]

A Story i saw on the net got me thinking  when Cryptocurrency becomes well known worldwide and its generally accepted, can transactions be traced or tracked
A South African teenager was found Thursday four days after he was kidnapped by a gang who demanded a ransom in bitcoin cryptocurrency worth about $123,000 (105,000 euros), police said.

Police declined to say if any ransom had been paid after the 13-year-old boy was taken in the eastern province of Mpumalanga while playing near his home and driven away in a car.

Local media published a ransom note left at the scene demanding 15 bitcoins and giving an address for a bitcoin “wallet” — an internet location where the virtual currency can be stashed.... Etc you get the point.

 If the BTC address in known and assoicated with a given individual then yes it is possible to trace those transactions.  There are other coins and mixing services that can truly anonymize that, but BTC and others can be traced if you are not careful.

[KrishaBitcoin]

A Story i saw on the net got me thinking  when Cryptocurrency becomes well known worldwide and its generally accepted, can transactions be traced or tracked
A South African teenager was found Thursday four days after he was kidnapped by a gang who demanded a ransom in bitcoin cryptocurrency worth about $123,000 (105,000 euros), police said.

Police declined to say if any ransom had been paid after the 13-year-old boy was taken in the eastern province of Mpumalanga while playing near his home and driven away in a car.

Local media published a ransom note left at the scene demanding 15 bitcoins and giving an address for a bitcoin “wallet” — an internet location where the virtual currency can be stashed.... Etc you get the point.

Yes Bitcoin transactions can be easily to trace now as long as you have the wallet address. Etherscan alone is a huge help to make tracing possible like someone of us getting tag due to multiple accounts. Now the possibilities of the wallet address owner of not to be caught is to avoid local exchanges of converting the 15 Bitcoin in full so better they will transfer it to multiple wallets to make confusion of the authorities.

[Milamol]

In some countries it is possible to exchange crypto for cash without providing any true data about yourself. Also, in some crypto exchanges, you can internal transfers between accounts. This is a great opportunity for all sorts of cunning people.
While we, as owners of crypto-currencies, are poorly protected, obviously we must take care of our own security.

[lunaelucemauram]

If the person is crafty enough to conceal their tracks in the internet such as tranfering funds to multiple wallets it will be hard to track them. Also if these people also are hackers then tracking them is also next to imposible. That is why protection of your own in the internet is important along with your own personal security as you can be targeted by such people.

[Grechkatx]

Yes, there are many programs for this. You can contact and consult with these companies and they will help you with the solution of this problem. Or look on the Internet for a solution to this problem.

[joelsamuya]

A Story i saw on the net got me thinking  when Cryptocurrency becomes well known worldwide and its generally accepted, can transactions be traced or tracked
A South African teenager was found Thursday four days after he was kidnapped by a gang who demanded a ransom in bitcoin cryptocurrency worth about $123,000 (105,000 euros), police said.

Police declined to say if any ransom had been paid after the 13-year-old boy was taken in the eastern province of Mpumalanga while playing near his home and driven away in a car.

Local media published a ransom note left at the scene demanding 15 bitcoins and giving an address for a bitcoin “wallet” — an internet location where the virtual currency can be stashed.... Etc you get the point.

Yes, bitcoins is traceable, this is what the programs is intended for, although this is normal in cryptocurrency, i would say its better to be traceable than a secret bank transactions which anybody cannot trace, unless the owner itself, there is no hide transactions when it comes to bitcoins, if you know the wallet address then you can trace it right away. While this is called transparency, it has some disadvantages, like the situation you have stated on your statement. And if this would become worldwide accepted, possibility of having this incidents may occur in due time, lets be more careful with our wallets. Its better to be safe than sorry.