Coinbase the most anti-Bitcoin organisation. Make #DeleteCoinbase great again

[Sparrow96]

No wonder! Joining Coinbase, you will need to compromise with your identity. They are collecting your email. Then you need to submit your Identity Cards(National ID card, Passport, Driving License, etc). Without verification, you can't use their service. Once they let users use their service without verification. As of now, Coinbase is requiring all users to verify their identity. Also, you are not holding any private keys. They can freeze your account at any time with any excuse. You will have nothing to do without waiting for the result of the investigation. So, leave Coinbase and  use a non-custodial wallet.

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[o_e_l_e_o]

-snip-

None of what you say is incorrect, but they don't constitute the reasons behind the Delete Coinbase campaign.

Every centralized exchange demands private information for KYC purposes. Exchanges which offer unverified accounts often lock those accounts at a later date and demand verification. You never hold your private keys with any centralized exchange. Now, if you ask me, these reasons are enough to not use any centralized exchange, and I profoundly disagree with KYC in all its forms. However, most centralized exchanges do these things as they are necessary to comply with the laws and regulations placed upon them.

Coinbase takes things to a whole new level with their production and leasing of blockchain analysis technology to a whole host of government agencies and third parties. While other exchanges invade your privacy as means to abide by regulations, Coinbase invades your privacy as a means to generate profit. While other exchanges just invade the privacy of their customers, Coinbase attempts to invade the privacy of every bitcoin user in the world. And the whole time they tell blatant lies about "respecting privacy" and "financial freedom".

[KIZILAGA]

 cex are most weak side of crypto..

[pepeepe]

Coinbase is too simple to use for the noobs so I don’t think they’re ever going to get truly boycotted en masse.
Brian Armstrong is an asshole but assholes rule the world.

There are many good exchanges in cryptocurrency. I think Coinbase is one of the best exchanges. It is very easy to exchange in this coinbase and you can exchange with confidence without any hesitation.

[Jating]

Don't forget Brian's Armstrong tweet as well, pure FUD that causes the flash crash in recent days.

Good thing though that we have bounce back to $18k already. But I consider his tweet FUD that triggers the sell-off.



https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1331744884856741888

[o_e_l_e_o]

Don't forget Brian's Armstrong tweet as well

I had not seen those tweets - thanks for sharing. They are particularly eye opening when it comes to Coinbase's CEO attitude. Even when pretending to care about his customers and users, he can't let slip his real motivations.

but it is a bad idea in practice because it is often impractical to collect identifying information on a recipient in the cryptoeconomy.

No. It is a bad idea in practice because it is fundamentally antithetical to the very purpose of bitcoin to require a third party to demand KYC before any transaction can be made. He doesn't care about that though. He doesn't care about undermining bitcoin or indeed about bitcoin at all - he only cares about how much it will cost his company to enforce these rules.

Finally, many recipients (in the U.S. or abroad) who value their financial privacy, may simply not want to upload more identifying documents to various companies, which could be hacked or stolen.

Haha, hypocrite much? Give us all your personal details, which we will happily hand over to your government, as well as giving them technology to spy on you, but make sure you value your financial privacy!

This would be bad for America because it would force U.S. consumers to use foreign unregulated crypto companies to get access to these services.

Read between the lines. "This would be bad for Coinbase because it would mean our customers use different exchanges."

[fillippone]

Coinbase is at it again:

Coinbase wants to sell blockchain analysis software to the IRS and DEA a year after its Neutrino acquisition

Quick Take

• Public records show that Coinbase wants to sell blockchain analytics software to the U.S. government
• Records indicate that the awards have not been made as of yet
• Both the DEA and IRS have expressed interest in awarding contracts to Coinbase for an analytics platform called Coinbase Analytics
• The developments come a year after Coinbase’s controversial purchase of intelligence firm Neutrino, and Neutrino is mentioned in the IRS documentation

They are at it again.
They are finally leveraging their Neutrino acquisition, inking a deal with the government, at the expense of the privacy of their userbase.
Of course, information is public and accessible, so Coinbase is not telling anything that is not already public and available, but of course, being themselves in the position of knowledge of a lot of private details of their users puts them in a debatable position. On one side they sell privacy disrupting technologies to the government, on the other they have plenty of data about their userbase, and they are obliged to show those to the government on request. Their declaration about od the two areas being completely separate doesn't make me more relaxed about this. To me, it looks like another way of monetizing their userbase, not providing them additional features, or services, but instead selling their data to the governments.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Everything you say is correct, but that news article is over a year old.

I was just discussing this in another thread so I've got the links handy, but through public records you can see just how many contracts Coinbase Analytics and other blockchain analysis companies have received from the DEA, IRS, and other government agencies:

Chainalysis - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22CHAINALYSIS+INC.%22
Elliptic - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22ELLIPTIC+INC.%22
Ciphertrace - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22CIPHERTRACE%2C+INC.%22
Coinbase Analytics - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22COINBASE%2C+INC.%22

The most recent contract for Coinbase Analytics was signed just 5 days ago for a nice $455,000 by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It's probably also worth noting that the IRS were already hiring out Neutrino before Coinbase acquired them and changed their name to Coinbase Analytics, so it's no surprise that these contracts have been ongoing: https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22NEUTRINO+SRL%22&x=0&y=0.

Given that Coinbase have admitted to illegally selling customer information to third parties, and suffered literally no repercussions from it, then of course they will be monetizing their user data as part of these contracts.

[fillippone]

Everything you say is correct, but that news article is over a year old.

You are absolutely right.

I was reading an article on Coindesk, and I click through various links, where they said "first reported", and I thought I was looking for the original source, while in reality, I was reading an old article.

I should have linked this one:

Homeland Security inks deal with Coinbase for its blockchain analytics software

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has signed a deal with Coinbase to use its blockchain tracing software, Coinbase Analytics.

The current deal value is $455,000 for one year, but it can go up to a total amount of $1.4 million through 2024, according to government tracker USAspending.gov.

Thanks for pointing out.

[o_e_l_e_o]

At the time, the company stressed that "the information offered in Coinbase Analytics has always been kept completely separate from Coinbase internal data."

But also:

Coinbase "is the only vendor who can provide the licenses required by the agency," it said.

So we are to believe that out of all the blockchain analysis companies, some of which (such as Chainalysis) are larger than Coinbase Analytics, have been running for much longer, and have already received (and are continuing to receive) hundreds of contracts worth tens of millions of dollars from multiple US government agencies, Coinbase is the only one which can provide the information the government want in this case, but it definitely has nothing to do with the fact that they are the only blockchain analysis company attached to a major exchange.

Oh, and although Coinbase have admitted selling user data to a bunch of unknown external third parties without knowledge or consent of their users, they definitely aren't sharing user data between two branches of the same company.

I don't buy this nonsense for a second. Coinbase are absolutely selling out their users to the government.

[fillippone]

Coinbase confirms itself a pro-government organisation, even if they ask them aggressive actions against their customers:
Today this picture was all over Twitter:



If you leave your coins on an exchange, you leave yourself exposed to those aggressive practices.  Canadian government is now on a dystopian berserker after the “trucker incident”.
 Actually, honey badger doesn’t care.

[RickDeckard]

Sadly it seems that Canada isn't the only country where this law will apply fillippone - clients from Japan and Singapore will also be affected by it[1]! For Canada it seems that the rule will start being applied on the 4th of April. Here's the requirements for both Japan and Singapore respectfully:

For users in Singapore, all crypto transfers from a Coinbase user’s exchange wallet to an outside address will require the recipient's full name and country of residence. This will take effect on April 1, with Coinbase citing local Singaporean regulations.

And in Japan, all transfers of crypto assets to recipients outside of Japan must include the recipient’s name, address and destination wallet, according to the English translation of rules established by the Japan Cryptocurrency Trading Association (JVCEA). This will take effect on April 1.

This is totally mindblowing, it looks more and more like the traditional banking system... I wonder will other exchanges also have to comply with these laws? I'm guessing that Binance somehow will "evade" this rule as it has been evading others for a while now...
[1]https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/03/25/coinbase-to-require-recipient-information-for-crypto-transfers-from-users-in-canada-singapore-and-japan/

[fillippone]

<…>
This is totally mindblowing, it looks more and more like the traditional banking system... I wonder will other exchanges also have to comply with these laws? I'm guessing that Binance somehow will "evade" this rule as it has been evading others for a while now...

Every exchange must abide to regulation. This is a certainty, the point is Coinbase always is the first to fully implement regulations, in the detrimental interest of his users. Unless, as speculated, that real users of Coinbase are the Governments and tax agencies around the world.

[aysg76]

Coinbase confirms itself a pro-government organisation, even if they ask them aggressive actions against their customers:
Today this picture was all over Twitter:

Yeah just witnessed these pictures of Canadian customers receiving this email from Coinbase where you need to disclose the information above $1000 CAD to anyone like the recipient which has shattered the privacy issues and people are against this.But we might be familiar with these behaviour of exchanges who in order to run abide by these rules and become puppets of the federal agencies more likely operating for them.They have said it is implemented due to the Canada's FINTAC
rules covering these transactions but this is stupidity because where is the privacy?

But wait there was not much of privacy things over coinbase early also as they were selling out the personal information of the users to some companies and DEA to track their transactions records also, denying user withdrawal request many times.If you Google about it then you would also know privacy issues with them.But now they have gone one more step ahead becoming government agents.

They have stated the  requirements of additional information also which is beyond imagination like seriously they want name, address and above it some more so no fun of using these services.

If you leave your coins on an exchange, you leave yourself exposed to those aggressive practices.

That's well said and never trust these exchanges for your funds because they are now being operated under central monopolies of which we need to be freed.Moreover not your keys not your coins is for these exchanges.
 

Canadian government is now on a dystopian berserker after the “trucker incident”.
 Actually, honey badger doesn’t care.

Actually they are also not able to freeze the bitcoin donations being sent for the truckers convoy protest worth millions of dollars so now they are cracking up new things to put some peer pressure but will end up with nothing in their hands.So let them try with all these coinbase tricks and we might see user downfall in them.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Every exchange must abide to regulation. This is a certainty, the point is Coinbase always is the first to fully implement regulations, in the detrimental interest of his users.

I've said it before, but where is the outrage? Where is the lobbying? Where is the fight? As usual, absolutely nothing from Coinbase other than complete and immediate submission and selling out their users in order to continue to line their own pockets.

Unless, as speculated, that real users of Coinbase are the Governments and tax agencies around the world.

Hit the nail on the head. Coinbase are going the same way of other large companies like Meta and Google - they are steadily transitioning to a data harvesting company. All the services and products they provide are really just a means to collecting and monetizing more data.

[fillippone]

<…>

Unless, as speculated, that real users of Coinbase are the Governments and tax agencies around the world.

Hit the nail on the head. Coinbase are going the same way of other large companies like Meta and Google - they are steadily transitioning to a data harvesting company. All the services and products they provide are really just a means to collecting and monetizing more data.

Some spies of mine referred me  that Coinbase is selling their services to institutional customers exactly this way: ultra compliance safe, regulation abiding, even at cost of being slightly behind the curve regarding to products offering.
That‘s enough said.

[RickDeckard]

Every exchange must abide to regulation. This is a certainty, the point is Coinbase always is the first to fully implement regulations, in the detrimental interest of his users.

I've said it before, but where is the outrage? Where is the lobbying? Where is the fight? As usual, absolutely nothing from Coinbase other than complete and immediate submission and selling out their users in order to continue to line their own pockets.

I think that this is an expected behaviour of a company with so many ties to the US government at least - as you've rightful reported in another thread o_e_l_e_o[1]. I think that Coinbase simply doesn't want to go against/repel the government pleads simply because they want to fall on their good grace and eventually land similar contracts such as the ones it has with the USA government. The fact that Brian Armstrong - Coinbase CEO - literally sold $292 million in shares in the first day that Coinbase went up in NASDAQ really shows the kind of driver behind his goals towards Coinbase and its future.
[1]https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5253616.msg57990134#msg57990134
[2]https://www.reuters.com/technology/coinbase-chief-executive-armstrong-sold-2918-million-shares-opening-day-2021-04-19/

[o_e_l_e_o]

Some spies of mine referred me  that Coinbase is selling their services to institutional customers exactly this way: ultra compliance safe, regulation abiding, even at cost of being slightly behind the curve regarding to products offering.

I was just thinking along the same lines of the post by RickDeckard above, but in relation to this point as well. We already know that Coinbase is anti-bitcoin, anti-privacy, pro-regulation, and pro-government by their ongoing work with the CIA, FBI, IRS, ICE, and a variety of other government agencies. It's no surprise really, when they are so happy to jump in to bed with the government, that they would be happy to jump in to bed with fiat banks and other institutions. Anything in the name of profit when it comes to Coinbase, to the detriment of all their users and even to bitcoin itself. As long as they keep lining their own pockets, right?

[aysg76]

I was just thinking along the same lines of the post by RickDeckard above, but in relation to this point as well. We already know that Coinbase is anti-bitcoin, anti-privacy, pro-regulation, and pro-government by their ongoing work with the CIA, FBI, IRS, ICE, and a variety of other government agencies. It's no surprise really, when they are so happy to jump in to bed with the government, that they would be happy to jump in to bed with fiat banks and other institutions. Anything in the name of profit when it comes to Coinbase, to the detriment of all their users and even to bitcoin itself. As long as they keep lining their own pockets, right?

Exactly these exchanges works like some private firms setup for their own benefits who is promising big to the customers but in reality they are in line up with these central agencies working on their behalf to fool people.They are getting huge revenues from the customer but also compromising their security at big level like selling information to DEA and IRS or say other sources also.

Coinbase sold their blockchain analytics software to these agencies and openly announced it on the net but have they shared that users privacy is also being shared with them in order to track them down? No way they have stated in the privacy policy that it's because no money laundering or illicit use of funds take place but they are themselves doing such shaddy business.I don't understand if we are trading in decentralised coins like bitcoin with the help of these centralised exchange asking for privacy and KYC then what's the fun of decentralisation?

The Vidovics' account had risen to $168,596 on April 28 when the hacking occurred, according to account statements the Vidovics shared with CNBC. That amount was essentially wiped out, with only a $587.15 balance shown the next day.

Since 2016, Coinbase users have filed more than 11,000 complaints against Coinbase with the Federal Trade Commission and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, mostly related to customer service.

There are many such cases you will find against coinsbase frauds and it's almost clear they are backed by these government agencies to work for them.The CEO brain and all other complies to their demands and give them records which they use against customers to track them dowm.So better evade the use of these centralised exchanges before that.

[fillippone]

Today I received this email:



Making your voice heard ahead of Thursday’s critical EU vote


The text referenced in the email is the following one:

Making your voice heard ahead of Thursday’s critical EU vote

By Paul Grewal, Chief Legal Officer


Bad facts make bad law. We see this in jurisdictions all over the world, especially when it comes to digital assets. Unfortunately, we are about to see this again — this time in the European Union — in the form of a revision to the Transfer of Funds Regulation. If adopted, this revision would unleash an entire surveillance regime on exchanges like Coinbase, stifle innovation, and undermine the self-hosted wallets that individuals use to securely protect their digital assets. The vote will likely take place this week so time is running out.

Here are the bad “facts”:

(1) digital assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum and others are a primary way criminals hide and move money

(2) law enforcement has no way to track these movements

(3) requiring collection and verification of personal information associated with self-hosted is not a violation of their privacy

State of play

The truth is that digital assets are in general a markedly inferior way for criminals to hide their illicit financial activity. That’s why, according to the best research available, by far the most popular way to hide illicit financial activity remains cash. Unlike with cash, law enforcement can track and trace digital asset transfers with advanced analytics tools. None of this requires upsetting the settled privacy expectations of wallet holders because the open architecture underlying digital assets is public and offers unprecedented transparency into transaction details. The records are also permanent — no one (not crypto companies, not governments, not even bad actors) can destroy or alter information. In short, digital assets and the immutable nature of their blockchain technology actually enhances the ability to detect and deter illicit activity. But rather than embracing and leveraging the benefits that arise from the increasing use of digital assets, the EU’s proposal would cast them aside and impose a host of new privacy invasions on wallet users.

For example, all crypto transactions will be deemed “travel rule eligible”. This means crypto is treated differently to fiat (which has a 1,000 EUR threshold), which establishes a clear advantage for traditional financial service providers over new technology, with significant anti-competition and anti-innovation implications.

Among the worst of the proposed provisions are new obligations on exchanges to collect, verify and report information on non-customers using self-hosted wallets. For instance, one provision requires exchanges to not only collect personal data about wallet users who are not their customers, but to also verify the data’s accuracy before allowing a transfer to one of their customers. In fiat terms, this would basically mean you cannot take money out of your bank account to send to someone else until you share personal data with your financial institution about that person and verify their identity. Not only is this verification requirement nearly impossible to do but requiring exchanges to engage in extensive data collection, verification, and retention about non-customers runs against core EU data protection principles of data minimization and proportionality.

Another dangerous provision would require exchanges to inform “competent authorities” of every single transfer from a non-customer’s self-hosted wallet equal to or greater than 1,000 EUR — regardless of any suspicion of bad activity. The proposal even leaves the door open to a total ban on transfers to self-hosted wallets even though there is no evidence that such a ban would have any impact on illicit activity at all. Like we said, bad facts make bad policy.

Make your voice heard

There’s precious time to act and we need to make our voices heard. A vote on Parliament’s draft proposal could come as early as Thursday, March 31st. If you care about protecting the privacy of individuals, and focusing the law on solutions that actually address legitimate concerns about the illicit use of digital assets, now is the time to speak up and be heard. We must speak with one, strong voice against this proposal before it’s too late.

Now, are we so endangered we must resort to Coinbase to resist for our rights?