Bitmain now requiring KYC documentation to buy hardware

[BitHodler]

Soon you will need a KYC verification to be allowed to breathe and you will have to pay a VAT

It's somewhat of a joke the way you put it, but we're definitely heading towards a state where everything we do gets taxed one way or another, especially when it concerns crypto currencies.

Bitmain is an easy target for authorities due to their size and dominant position within this industry. In a way they have grown far into the altcoin market as well, which is a plus for authorities since it's considered a win win situation.

By subjecting one entity to KYC they cover a massive part of this industry. That's what centralization does when there's no proper competition to challenge Bitmain. I hope it will change in the next few years.

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[Patatas]

It's somewhat of a joke the way you put it, but we're definitely heading towards a state where everything we do gets taxed one way or another, especially when it concerns crypto currencies.

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy. They will change it or will be replaced by another company which doesn't enforce such policies. It's really upto the people to decide how to go about a government tactic. Evey exchange has started to ask for verifications and everybody is doing it you see, the government did their thing but it's only upto the masses to decide if they would abide or boycott it.

[erk]

That sounds so wrong, what's next nVidia asking for KYC to purchase a video card?

[Steamtyme]

Regardless of how many home/small miners run from this they will be fine. The massive Data Centers ordering units by the 1000 have no issuie providing KYC info, as they are running massive operations and to reap the benefits as such are already transparent with their government and any other business they deal with. Those orders alone could sustain the business. Not to mention they like to make their gear for themselves to use anyways.

I wonder if they'll apply this to people who want to mine on their pool? That would be interesting as that is a massive revenue stream for them due to uneducated miners.

I like eBay, but you get charged a pretty hefty premium for buying ASICs most of the time compared to buying direct or from this forum, especially when the market's going upwards.
That brings me to another point- in Computer Hardware*snip*

Agreed on both fronts. I still check ebay from time to time, but it's been a while since I've had to go there over using the marketplace. It's nice knowing it's there as I did manage to earn a few extra bucks during th eFOM on ebay.

you can get miners pretty cheap if you buy them in multiples.*snip* 10 antminter S9s for £4100 which were seven months old in my mind is a bargain.

Sounds to me like you should check out cryptouniverse, sorry for assuming your continent of origin based on the monetary symbols used.

Also I would suggest looking into their Canaan products as opposed to the S9's.

[buwaytress]

OK, this is new to me. I can't see any non-commercial reason for requiring (as opposed to wanting) KYC procedures.

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Would seem to be counter-intuitive. GDPR's actually resulted in de-risking from most companies and organisations. GDPR simply means companies requiring data to have to state a justification for it and then to prove that they have all the compliance measures in place. If cookie management is already a hard enough task for most websites to manage (I actually haven't seen a single crypto website already GDPR compliant), why would they want to go a step farther? All that data controller obligations with requesting KYC will kill them.

Localbitcoins recently appended a particularly MASSIVE gdpr compliant privacy policy as far as I can remember.

The funny thing is, my banks don't have a gdpr compliance, they're still happy sharing all of my information with everyone as much as they want to :-) (for credit scores and such)...

Yes, and that's because Localbitcoins has an existing need for KYC, it handles so much transactions and harbours so much data that they can't actually derisk unless they outsource or decentralise the request of and storage of personal data - which doesn't anyway completely cut them off from GDPR obligations (it doesn't make them the data controller but it still makes them responsible for monitoring the controller). It still doesn't make sense in Bitmain's case, although the SEC's requirements for them to step up would make some rationale.

And yeah, none of my banks seem to have upgraded their privacy policies. They might feel safer though, as banks already have cause for requesting and storing data thanks to coexisting AML directives.

[1Referee]

That sounds so wrong, what's next nVidia asking for KYC to purchase a video card?

You're not far off. If you look at the main intention of governments, which is to localize every purchaser of crypto, then miners are just as much of a target as those who buy crypto through centralized exchanges. In the end it's all about the control governments want to obtain over what they consider to be a dangerous vehicle.

I can totally see a time where if you want to buy more than three GPU's from the same reseller that you have to verify yourself. Just think about it, what's the easiest way to obtain crypto without buying it and without sacrificing your personal information? It's mining. It's somewhat of a loophole governments want to make less easy to exploit.

If people think this is bad already, then wait for what has to come in the forthcoming years.

[figmentofmyass]

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

that's the biggest reason i avoid KYC in this space. i only have documents on file with one exchange, and i sure as hell am not giving documents to bitmain---they were already hacked last year and had customer information compromised! (not that i'm a miner anyway)

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy.

how does KYC work for corporate clients? many large miners may not care at all.

it's up to the market. last i checked, miners from GMO and others still can't compete with bitmain. this is some additional incentive to go elsewhere, but i dunno if it's enough to make a real difference. unfortunately, people tend to sacrifice their privacy and just get on with their business as usual.

[jackg]

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

that's the biggest reason i avoid KYC in this space. i only have documents on file with one exchange, and i sure as hell am not giving documents to bitmain---they were already hacked last year and had customer information compromised! (not that i'm a miner anyway)

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy.

how does KYC work for corporate clients? many large miners may not care at all.

it's up to the market. last i checked, miners from GMO and others still can't compete with bitmain. this is some additional incentive to go elsewhere, but i dunno if it's enough to make a real difference. unfortunately, people tend to sacrifice their privacy and just get on with their business as usual.

I think anyone related to Bitcoin will have an issue with this. They might have lost a large number of those clients when they limited sale items per batch to 10.

No one answered my other question, we don't know their identities. Last time I sent an email to their support, the replies called themselves "1". I know there's only one person on the help desk but still...

Why not just use the Chinese site and a translation engine (other than Google translate).

[BitHodler]

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy. They will change it or will be replaced by another company which doesn't enforce such policies. It's really upto the people to decide how to go about a government tactic. Evey exchange has started to ask for verifications and everybody is doing it you see, the government did their thing but it's only upto the masses to decide if they would abide or boycott it.

Bitmain is probably the most hated entity within this industry, but yet they are still growing and generate more sales than ever before. I don't think any form of boycott will inflict damage on their business.

I think that that people and businesses buying hardware from Bitmain will just cope with the KYC requirements since their potential mining rewards have more priority than their personal information.

Another thing is that verification is a one time event. After their initial verification process they won't be bothered with more verification requests. In other words, people's "sin" will no longer follow them everywhere.

[Quidat]

Anyone know the reasoning behind this?  Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does.  I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

Don't even aware that they do already impose KYC when buying out their hardware. This would really give a big significant effect on their sales.We do understand that they do follow government rules
but I don't see this would really be good into their company.Inspite on having a very unprofitable mining business nowadays and you would add up struggle on purchasing miners then I do foresaw on what would happen.

[magneto]

No idea why you should be asked for ID for purchase of a good.

Apparently, it's because of mounting regulatory pressure from the country which they are running from, which is understandable. The regulation of crypto businesses and markets are happening on a massive scale at the moment, and that basically means stricter KYC across the board.

If it was actually the regulators asking them to do this, then it's totally understandable that Bitmain is taking this step to prevent them from being flagged as a business. But I don't really see anyone else doing this, especially if you're just trading hardware P2P.

[Wong Goblog]

KYC's goal is to keep bad things happening someday, nowadays many people freely create accounts and most of these accounts die so that with KYC it makes the database more actual and does not contain useless data.

[timerland]

It's interesting that they are having two different standards.

If you are a "domestic" user (which I'm assuming is a user from the country that they're operating from, China), then you're apparently still allowed to purchase up to 300,000 RMB. While if you're an international user, you can't purchase without verification anymore. If anyone knows why this is the case, please let me know.

But this is definitely just reflective of the entire regulatory environment of cryptos in general - regulators are quite hostile towards bitcoin at the moment and this attitude isn't really changing any time soon. You can buy anything else on the web without any KYC, yet when it comes to miners, you need KYC. Imagine if you had to get groceries using KYC in the future. Absurd, right? There is no legit reason why mining equipment should be treated differently.

[1Referee]

if bitcoin or any major cryptocurrency (which use PoW and can be mined with ASIC) community want to change to PoW "resistant" algorithm, that would hurt Bitmain (along with other ASIC manufacture) significantly.
If 51%+ of mining hashrate comes from Bitmain's pool or ASIC, i'm sure there will be boycott attempt.

Smaller coins could relatively easily change their fundamentals, but that's unlikely to happen in Bitcoin's case, especially when there is no reason to do so.

If you have been following Bitmain's (BTC & Antpool's) network share in the last months, they have done everything they could to reduce dominance of their pools, and that's the only proper way to deal with this situation. Bitmain knows better than anyone how destructive it is for them to let their pools grow endlessly. Perfect example of that is how endless growth resulted in the downfall of GHash.IO back in the days.

Bitmain needs Bitcoin, for that single reason they won't ever attempt to directly harm it.

[BitBerau]

They're doing this due to their IPO coming up.. Regardless I'd rule out buying from bitmain, theres quite a bit of competition now.

[pinkflower]

Anyone know the reasoning behind this?  Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does.  I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

One reason can be regulatory pressure or the anticipation of regulatory pressure. But this is good for Bitmain mining resellers. They can do the KYC requirements to order the hardware themselves and sell with a margin on everyone who doesnt want to give up their identity.

[gentlemand]

Bitmain is probably the most hated entity within this industry, but yet they are still growing and generate more sales than ever before. I don't think any form of boycott will inflict damage on their business.

You sure about that? They're looking distinctly wobbly compared to the past. Their IPO thing is fraying by the minute, their main miner is a couple of years old now, they bet a huge amount on Bcash and other companies are starting to emerge.

Their moment as the absolute dominant force they are may have passed with can only be a good thing for everyone.

As for this KYC stuff, what if someone buys it in bits? Is it a bit like a mining chip and guns and their lower receiver?

[BitHodler]

You sure about that? They're looking distinctly wobbly compared to the past. Their IPO thing is fraying by the minute, their main miner is a couple of years old now, they bet a huge amount on Bcash and other companies are starting to emerge.

Well, despite all that they can't yet be bothered by any other player within this industry for the time being, but I agree that their market share is shrinking and will continue to shrink with how other players flow in and gain share.

Bitmain's bet on Bcash is a necessity with how there is next to no legit depth in any of the orderbooks. They used their Bitcoins to remain a ratio of 1/10 but it failed to hold and it tanked to below 0.08BTC this month.

The biggest threat to Bitmain in the very short term is a collapse of Bcash without artificial buy support. I wonder when Jihan will start to use his own Bitcoins to support the price when Bitmain no longer can afford to do it.

[gentlemand]

The biggest threat to Bitmain in the very short term is a collapse of Bcash without artificial buy support. I wonder when Jihan will start to use his own Bitcoins to support the price when Bitmain no longer can afford to do it.

I find the whole thing incomprehensible. I don't see how someone can be that blinkered they'd throw large amounts of their own money at it.

Coerce others into burning their own money by all means. That's where their power and resources should've been solely directed - witness the fucking with the hashrate around difficulty adjustments and making companies like Bitpay into BCH bitches, but any one entity/faction singlehandedly trying to prop up a market is pure suicide.

I guess by the end of the year we'll see what's what but it seems like a very strange and amateurish move on their part.

[pinkflower]

if bitcoin or any major cryptocurrency (which use PoW and can be mined with ASIC) community want to change to PoW "resistant" algorithm, that would hurt Bitmain (along with other ASIC manufacture) significantly.
If 51%+ of mining hashrate comes from Bitmain's pool or ASIC, i'm sure there will be boycott attempt.

Smaller coins could relatively easily change their fundamentals, but that's unlikely to happen in Bitcoin's case, especially when there is no reason to do so.

I agree, however the idea PoW algorithm or consensus method change has been around for a while (even though at best it stays as proposal) and IMO Bitmain might be reason if they even have 50%+ on ASIC marketshare.

Bitmain needs Bitcoin, for that single reason they won't ever attempt to directly harm it.

At least for now, even though IMO they indirectly harm Bitcoin.

Anyone know the reasoning behind this?  Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does.  I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

One reason can be regulatory pressure or the anticipation of regulatory pressure. But this is good for Bitmain mining resellers. They can do the KYC requirements to order the hardware themselves and sell with a margin on everyone who doesnt want to give up their identity.

I'm sure you can't hide your identity just by buy from 3rd party, unless it's done person-to-person (not though marketplace such as eBay).

I wasnt talking about Ebay. But you are right, no one can hide online privacy in full, but you can set up a mining equipment webshop that doesnt ask for KYC/AML documents. If buyers dont want to give up their documents to Bitmain then they have to buy from your webshop.