[2019-07-06]Iranian Official Says US Congress is Working to Block Iran’s Crypto

[Vladdirescu87]

Iranian Official Says US Congress is Working to Block Iran’s Crypto Mining

Saeed Zarandi, Iranian Assistant Minister of Industry, Trade, and Supply, said that US Congress is working to stop Iran’s access to cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin (BTC) mining, as reported by local news service Al-Fars on July 6.

According to Zarandi, Congress considers cryptocurrency a tool for evading sanctions and money laundering, and is therefore trying to legislate against Iran’s access to it, complicating Iran’s legislation.

Commenting that the issue of cryptocurrencies remained unsettled in Iran, Zarandi reportedly said that Iranian ministries are working with the Central Bank of Iran to settle the subject of cryptocurrencies and their usage within Iran.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/iranian-official-says-us-congress-is-working-to-block-irans-crypto-mining

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[hatshepsut93]

Iran themselves has recently seized 1000 miners because they were apparently drawing too much electricity, so why do they care about the US trying to block supply of miners? Iran has shown in the recent years that they are not crypto-friendly, because their country is a paranoid dictatorship, and this statement was made just to play a victim rather than legitimately care about crypto. Complete hypocrisy at its finest.

[LeGaulois]

Indirectly that's good news. When you see the geopolitical problems between both and the tension that keeps increasing, Iran will not let itself be fooled, it is not a bluff, unlike Trump.
It's Bitcoin that's going to be happy, we just have to see how the markets (and BTC) reacted the past weeks.

[hatshepsut93]

Indirectly that's good news. When you see the geopolitical problems between both and the tension that keeps increasing, Iran will not let itself be fooled, it is not a bluff, unlike Trump.
It's Bitcoin that's going to be happy, we just have to see how the markets (and BTC) reacted the past weeks.

Bitcoin doesn't care about geopolitical tensions, years of data prove that there's no correlation between negative events and price of Bitcoin. And in hypothetical scenario when shit seriously hits the fan, like WW3, Bitcoin wouldn't be a good store of value - it's dependent on the Internet (which is centralized and can be taken down), electronics, and it's not widely adopted as a currency, so it would be hard to spend it directly. In such times, cash and physical precious metals would rule.

[Theb]

So have Iran changed their views to cryptocurrencies especially when they recently are "concerned" with cryptocurrencies taking up too much power from their mining operations? The way I see it is its more like a political move rather then a diplomatic move done by Iran. Nevertheless this still sounds good overall for their crypto industry in terms of looking at the big picture especially when they are planning on how will they make things work for the industry.

[bitcoindusts]

So have Iran changed their views to cryptocurrencies especially when they recently are "concerned" with cryptocurrencies taking up too much power from their mining operations? The way I see it is its more like a political move rather then a diplomatic move done by Iran. Nevertheless this still sounds good overall for their crypto industry in terms of looking at the big picture especially when they are planning on how will they make things work for the industry.

That is if Iran is serious about cryptocurrency or more serious in making political issues with the US? I don’t see anything good with this poor hypocrite country. I guess they will not be able to sustain miners with good electricity if they are also struggling economically. They better focus on building their nuclear plants.

[veleten]

I wonder how are they going to enforce it?
block mining from Iran sounds as fantastic as making Iran comply with the imposed sanctions
what the US could do - block Iranian IP access to the controlled mining pools?
or monitor the coins that originated there? in any case , this is not going to happen , Iran has shown that they are ready to go all the way and the strike on their forces would mean a full out war
don't think trying to mess with their mining capabilities is as important as their nuclear programme , which , by the way taken a new turn with Iran enriching plutonium to the sub-nuclear weapon capable state , this could lead to unforeseen consequences and not only for the US , but for Israel , for example

[gentlemand]

I wonder how are they going to enforce it?
block mining from Iran sounds as fantastic as making Iran comply with the imposed sanctions
what the US could do - block Iranian IP access to the controlled mining pools?

This is what I was wondering too. Perhaps they want to block mining machine sales but I don't see how that can be done. I presume any self respecting pool has something in place regarding state fiddling with IPs and so on, if not Iran themselves will cobble something together.

But this is academic as I don't think the Iranian state will ever endorse real cryptocurrencies. Perhaps they'll try to put together another Petro style kludge.

[squatter]

I wonder how are they going to enforce it?
block mining from Iran sounds as fantastic as making Iran comply with the imposed sanctions
what the US could do - block Iranian IP access to the controlled mining pools?

This is what I was wondering too. Perhaps they want to block mining machine sales but I don't see how that can be done.

That's one route. Maybe they could threaten mining hardware producers with secondary sanctions. That's what the Treasury Department did with exchanges. Most of the exchanges fell into line pretty quickly over 2017-2018, banning Iranians from their platforms altogether rather than risking OFAC breathing down their neck.

[Slow death]

this Iran government is a big joke

Trading Bitcoin Is Illegal in Iran, Central Bank Official Warns

Buying and selling cryptocurrencies like bitcoin (BTC) is illegal in Iran, a senior government official declared

So it's not the US that's blocking Iran, Iran's own government does not like bitcoin