my MTGOX accoun frozen, can not withdraw, I have yubikey.

[sergio]

 Hi,
I am having problems withdrawing from MTGOX, this raises several red flags.

All MTGox is telling is that I have to verify my account, since a AML flag was put on my account.

This is the exact error I get:
"Your account is currently pending review, please visit https://mtgox.com/forms/verification"

This are the red flags:
MTGOX will not say who put the red flag in my account, if it was them or some government authority.
MTGOX will not say why the red flag was put in there in the first place.
IT is clear that MTGOX is no longer anonymous, I am afraid a lot of people that has anonymous accounts with them probably lost all their money, since it is no possible to authenticate and be anonymous simultaneously.

I had my money on mtgox in case of emergency, and I have spent over $200 to comply with them, so far no success, I sent them a zip file with 2 jpegs, and it was rejected because they were on a zip file.

They have no secure means of sending the jpegs, for example they are not allowed inside a zip, tar, arc, zoo or any packaging software, also no digital signatures, no md5sums, no crc checks, you have to send a plain jpeg and you have and them have no way of knowing if it got corrupted on the upload.

They claim their request for compliance does not cost money, and that is clearly false all government issue documents cost money and time, I can not think of a single official document that is free.

I requested a partial withdraw to comply with their verification request to cover cost, and it was rejected based on the law, however based on the law they hiding a lot of information from me that I am sure it is not part of the law.

Right now I have spend over $100 on documents, passport, ID, gas to drive to consulate, parking fees, mailing fee (consulate only accept secure mail), over $200 in total, and MTGOX is not moving a finger to liberate my money.

I never went over MTGOX withdraw limits, and I am way below the limits they require for verification, this is all nonsense and  it is costing me a lot of money, I am stranded in a foreign country with no money, and MTGOX is not proving quality communication, I have no idea why they decided to freeze my account.

In the account I have over $1100 and over 300 btc, and I am totally cashless, since the little money that I had I spent it all to comply with their verification.

I also have the yubikey, which was supped to prevent this type of problems, and I am not sure what good is it if they can still freeze you account without giving you any reason whatsoever other than telling you there was a flag in your account and no further details.

Are any of you having problems withdrawing from mtgox, and if so, what did you have to do? how long did it take to get the money out?

Any safe exchanges someone can recommend, if they are anonymous that would even be better, if not any exchange that does not freeze the accounts under any reason would be great.

[finway]

Have you try SupportDesk?   support.mtgox.com

[koin]

MTGOX will not say who put the red flag in my account, if it was them or some government authority.
MTGOX will not say why the red flag was put in there in the first place.
IT is clear that MTGOX is no longer anonymous, I am afraid a lot of people that has anonymous accounts with them probably lost all their money, since it is no possible to authenticate and be anonymous simultaneously.

this recurring theme keeps showing how bitcoin is just absolutely superior.  you just need to keep your bitcoins local except for those you transfer to the exchange on the day you wish to make a trade.  if the exchange pulls this garbage, you open a new account with a different exchange.

name any other asset that offers this convenience.

[sergio]

The problem is that they do not allow me to withdraw.

I already sent them a zip file containing only 2 jpegs, and it was rejected because it was a zip file, I pointed it to them that the zip file provides file integrity and the jpeg by itself does not.

In the name of security the zip file was rejected, and they offer no secure way of sending the jpegs, no md5sum, no crc checks, no pgp encription, no other program that verifies the integrity of the file, the problem is that I no longer trust them, and they could argue that the file did not contain information, it is a lot safer to send a file with a md5sum or contained in a zip file, if the file were to be damaged by whatever reason the zip program reports that, a jpeg file could be cut in half, and there is now way of knowing that.

The 2 jpegs contain my ID and passport initial process at the consulate with my picture, since for the official documents to arrive it is 3 to 4 weeks.

This is the email I recently got from mtgox:

mt.gox support, Feb 16 16:26 (JST):

Hello,

Unfortunately as part of our security policy we cannot accept ZIP files. Please submit two separates JPG documents into the verification

upload.

Thanks,

MtGox.com Team
"
And then they closed the case, and provided no way to send the 2 jpegs files securely.

Also they wont tell me who put the AML flag in my account, I have the feeling it was not the government but them to scam money out of their customers, otherwise they would have no reason to hide this information, and also there is no law that would prevent them from telling who put the AML flag in my account.

I have a feeling they are trying to scam some of their customers, the accounts that are anonymous are the most likely to suffer.

I would recommend everyone to treat mtgox like if it was paypal, it is behaving exactly the same way.

My recommendations in regards to mtgox, use it to trade only, do not leave your money there, a yubikey is useless if mtgox is the one trying to take your cash.

I have already sent them the information they required with a md5dum, and they do not have the technical knowledge to open a zip file, even less knowledge to verify an md5sum.

Mark Karpeles - Magicaltux please release my bitcoins and money I have on mtgox, I trusted you and you have failed me, and please do not speak in the name of security when it is being used to lock accounts without any known reasons, I would like you to tell me why a red flag was put in my account and by whom, my account is: sergio
I have already gone though your support forum at mtgox and it is failing me. Even a high school kid would know how to unzip a file, and that a zip file provides file integrity for the jpg contained inside them, that a jpeg alone does not, you have lost my complete respect when it comes to security, I should have listened to others when your site got hacked the first time.

[sergio]

I just sent another support ticket to mtgox, telling them I just want my money released, I do not care if the account has to be closed at this point, there is no point is having an account with Magicaltux if he can no longer be trusted.
I also insisted that they tell me who put the red flag in my account and by what reason, question Mark has been avoiding and is not answering.

To me Mtgox is game over.

To bad Tradehill had to close business.

Any reliable exchange someone could recommend me.

[finway]

I just sent another support ticket to mtgox, telling them I just want my money released, I do not care if the account has to be closed at this point, there is no point is having an account with Magicaltux if he can no longer be trusted.
I also insisted that they tell me who put the red flag in my account and by what reason, question Mark has been avoiding and is not answering.
To me Mtgox is game over.
To bad Tradehill had to close business.
Any reliable exchange someone could recommend me.

Why don't you just submit your .jpg file?

I don't think you can release money without getting verified at this stage.

This is fucking AML, forced by the govement.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I just sent another support ticket to mtgox, telling them I just want my money released, I do not care if the account has to be closed at this point, there is no point is having an account with Magicaltux if he can no longer be trusted.
I also insisted that they tell me who put the red flag in my account and by what reason, question Mark has been avoiding and is not answering.

To me Mtgox is game over.

To bad Tradehill had to close business.

Any reliable exchange someone could recommend me.

Please forgive for not taking sides on this issue, sergio, but feel that I need to state the following on your thread. I'm about to invest more money and time in this Bitcoin thingy, and the last thing I want the business owners I approach is to see threads like this one. I'm in no way dissing Mt Gox, but do feel that this issue should not have gone on this long if what sergio is stating is true. By sergio expressing his fustrations on a public forum, it does not bode well for Bitcoin in general, and we all lose. I truly hope that this issue gets resolved quickly.

~Bruno~

[Jointops420]

I had a flag put up on my account recently after months of no activity and sent off the ID as they stated, was verified very quickly after that. The only problem I have with them is how hard it is to get an order off when things are heating up.

[ribuck]

Just submit the jpg files, sergio, and see what happens.

You have to pick your battles. The battle between zip and jpg file formats is not the one you need to be fighting at the moment.

Making a big scene here is not going to help if you're not already doing whatever you can to resolve the problem.

[bitdragon]

you must ride the horse in the direction it is going.
Submitting the JPEG would have saved you time and money and taught you a lesson too.
And it is still worth it to do it now.

I do claim I now the feeling of being stranded with my hopes on mtgox funding my paxum card to get the heaven out of Hong Kong.
I asked them for a miracle and it did not happen and it feels shitty and an awful wait.
That is when the mind cracks open and you laugh about it later. There is always a solution, always.

As Bill Hicks said, it's only a ride

[bitdragon]

I didn't end up using his service in the end, but spendbitcoins.com can buy a plane ticket in return for bitcoins, at least with airasia, I just think that is really cool

[sergio]

Well if it is a AML thing by a goverment, why does not mtgox say that instead of hiding that information, and what goverment?

If it was the government and they had some reason, why hide it, and I could deal with the government directly, governments are made up by people, and there is usually a way to communicate to them if that was the case, but that information is not being provided by mtgox, also as being a customer that information would be of great value, but it simply is not being provided by mtgox.

I would like Mark Karpeles Magitux to tell me all the unanswered questions in regards my account on mtgox, what government put the red flag, and why, or if it was them, and why is it that they can not open a simple zip file containing only jpegs, or why the do not allow md5sum when sending files and they claim it is in the name of security, how is that? it makes no sence.

It is not a problem with the files zip vs jpeg, it is a matter of trust, at this point I do not trust them for anything, and I would prefer to have a method to make sure they get a good file, the way they have been behaving they could reject the files I sent and not tell me why, I would like the communication to be interactive which is not, it is a one way communication, nothing I ask gets answered, that is not the proper way to treat a customer.
years ago I used to download a lot of gifs, and then jpgs, and once a while one was corrupted, and it was not possible to tell if it was due to the download or if the file was actually damaged without downloading it again, for example when you download firmware it is critical that the file is not corrupted otherwise your hardware would get damaged, and for that reason usually you have some form to verify the file md5sum, crc, etc, in this case my money is at stake I have no problem sending them the jpegs together with md5sums, but they will not accept the md5sums, so they have no proper way to know if the file was received correctly and I have no proper way to know that either and since I do not trust them, that would be one less excuse for them to reject the files. So it is not the files it is a matter of trust, that is why I prefer to have extra security on my side, they claim the files without the md5sums is more secure, which is completely bogus.

Right now I am completely out of cash, not bitcoins, bitcoin itself is very secure, and I a strong believer in the bitcoin economy, I have invested a lot in mining, the only week point in the bitcoin economy are the exchanges.

All I want at this point from mtgox is to release my money.
I wrongly had a false sense of security because I had a yubikey.

It is also not right for them to change the rules of the game without an advance warning, so that you have a chance to get out in time.

I will keep mining, and will keep supporting the bitcoin economy, but not mtgox.

[Nefario]

.............

Any safe exchanges someone can recommend, if they are anonymous that would even be better, if not any exchange that does not freeze the accounts under any reason would be great.

Any exchange that does not freeze accounts for any reason is in risk of being shut down, all trustworthy exchanges will suspend accounts that appear to have fraudulent activity on them. Or is not trustworthy themselves.

This is because exchanges must co-operate with banks and they have not choice if they want to keep using the bank account.

The difference between a great exchange and a rubbish one is the customer service in dealing with your frozen account. MtGox are terrible at this, customer service is not something they seem to care about.

If you want an exchange that don't mess you around and actually answer your support issues then use Intersango, they're #2 now after TradeHill was shutdown.

[bitdragon]

the zip file thing is probably for their security, not yours.
I am no expert, but phishy things seem to be compiled in zips sometimes.

Japan, HSBC rules maybe? I would imagine they must follow some rules to stay in business with their bank.
There is improvement to be done and these recommendations need to be supplied to MTGOX as I believe they do wish to serve the customer.

At this point, it doesn't make sense for them to release money under your pressure. That would be a precedent undermining the whole process.
I am sure they have quite a share of pressure themselves in order not to get shut down completely.

Caution should be used with bitcoinica as there is no verifications now and Zhou tells not to worry either.

Time has come to develop relationships with individual people to handle your transactions in and out of bitcoin and/or mtgox. It is quicker and safer in my opinion.

[sergio]

"the zip file thing is probably for their security, not yours.
I am no expert, but phishy things seem to be compiled in zips sometimes."

That is not true, you can not compile things into zip files, a zip file only contains files, nothing else, it is the equivalent of an envelope when sending a letter or postcard, which is more secure a postcard with an envelope or one without an envelope?
If you have any file with an md5sum provided by someone that person is giving you a guarantee of the integrity of the file, how could a file without any guarantee of integrity be more secure.
And the problem is not the zip file, is the luck of trust, and compliance is about increasing security not decreasing it, if you send me a file with an md5sum that is much safer than one without, claiming otherwise is nonsense.
It happens that they have hidden so much information from me that I have no reason to trust them anymore, and I rather play it safe, added security does not go against compliance, and claiming otherwise is bogus.
For example proving an md5sum in what way whatsoever can be less secure is beyond me.

Also the law does not require them to hide the facts of by whom or why the account was frozen, remember the law is not anonymous, and I am sure mtgox is not required to hide those fact from the customer.

Also security by obscurity does not work, in the software world it has been proven that openness provides much greater security, than obscurity.

It could be an scam to confiscate accounts, or simply they do not care about their customers anymore.

I will follow the advice of giving intersango a try, and maybe a few other ones.

I have done everything mtgox has asked me, and no results so far, I am very disappointed in them.
I do not think it is the Japan goverment that put the red flag, I have a strong feeling it is mtgox themselves, the reason is simple, when someone is truly trying to help you out the communication is usually good, and when someone is stabbing you in the back there is usually very bad communication, and this applies just about anywhere.

In the meantime I will concentrate on getting my money out of mtgox, I hope Mark Karpeles read this and does something, mtgox already has 2 jpegs that I sent, ID, and Passport not in final version since that takes 3 to 4 weeks for the consulate to deliver, but the temporary paperwork I got from the consulate with my picture in both documents.

[kjlimo]

This is another case of "don't put all your eggs in one basket."  That's user error; not the error of the exchange. You should be ready and able to handle an investigation of this nature given the new nature of bitcoins.

I wouldn't be surprised if the gov't takes over mtgox.com for a short period of time pending investigation.

Please diversify your investments and don't put all of your trust in one entity.

In the account I have over $1100 and over 300 btc, and I am totally cashless, since the little money that I had I spent it all to comply with their verification.

[koin]

I have done everything mtgox has asked me, and no results so far,

so to clarify the situation, you have sent to them the documents in jpg format?

if you aren't aware how to do that, open a ticket and attach:
 - https://support.mtgox.com/anonymous_requests/new

if you haven't done that then please take your bruised ego elsewhere.

[red123]

mtgox is only so anonymous. If being anonymous is your number one concern I'd find a cash dealer because nothing other than cash is completely anonymous. Places like dwolla and mtgox are for people who aren't trying to stay anonymous. They are not made to be that way, therefore getting upset for it is a little silly.

I thought it was funny people with bank accounts on dwolla are flipping out because dwolla needs an ID now lol. If you're elaborate enough to walk into a bank and open up an account with a fake ID, SS and extravagant disguising abilities or somehow open an account dwolla accepts that is build on fraudulent information, than I'd understand but most people don't do this and personally, I'd offer my photo ID before my bank information in a heart beat. They have your account, what's the difference?

Cash in the mail is the way to go. Somewhat risky, but true anonymity (or as close to it as you can possible get) comes at a price.

[Mt.Gox Support]

Well, it seems that this is slightly going out of proportions.

You are all aware of the AML requirement by now and you are also aware of what we are asking for. Also we have very strict rules when it comes the list of documents we need and how we need them. This is of course in order to better protect everyone of us, by this I mean both client assets and Mt.Gox.

Now, as it is stipulated on our AML page that all documents that must be sent to us must be sent in the following format : JPG, PNG and PDF (See screenshot http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/195/screenshot20120217at103.png/). There is no mention at anytime of ZIP files or any other format including but not only BMP, TIFF, JPEG 2000, GIF... We hoped that this was clear enough for everyone, but apparently not.

While we are going to “rephrase” this part to make it “clearer” for everyone, we cannot and we will not accept any document sent in a ZIP file. The reason behind this request is simple : Company RULE. All files are stored on our servers and are not allowed to be stored on anyone’s computer here at Mt.Gox for obvious reasons.

We go even further in not working with ZIP files at an internal level. No ones here at Mt.Gox is allowed to transfer, use or work with ZIP files and this level of security is also applied for every documents coming form AML that will be hosted on our servers.

Sergio, please kindly send us the appropriate documents in either JPG, PNG of PDF and you will see that if your documents are indeed the appropriates ones and that everything is in order, the overall AML process will go smoothly.

[sergio]

MTGOX, you fail to answer why you will not provide any information at all of why the red flag was put in the account, and by whom, it is not against the law to provide this information.

By whom it could be you, some government authority of some country, or someone else, I do not know, but would like to know, as far as I am concerned it could be you, since you are hiding that information.

I have no problem sending the jpgs, but I do have a problem of you not having a method to verify its integrity at delivery, why do you oppose of using md5sums with the jpegs files, it is beyond me how using md5sums could be less secure, since it seems that the answer is in the name of security all the time. For an md5sum all it is required it is a single line of text, nothing else.

MTgox you failed to warn me when the account was locked, I had no exit window, when I did send the jpegs you complained because they were in a zip file, a zip file is just a container nothing else, it is like asking for a birth certificate, and getting it rejected because it was delivered in an envelope, a zip file does not carry information, only files, and in my case the files are jpegs. Treating a zip file like if it carried information by itself is plain ignorance it does not it is only a file container, think of it as a box where you put things in it.

My biggest concern is not the zip or jpeg files, is your lack of communication, at this point in time I have no clue who or why a red flag was put in my account, when in fact I did nothing out of the ordinary.

Also it is not fair for the users that you change the rules of the game after the game starts, what is going to happen to your customers that had anonymous account, will you confiscate and keep the money? Can you assure that will not happen? I have a feeling based on your behavior that could very well happen.

Please answer this questions, to me they are very important:
1. Why the red flag in my account, considering I have a yubikey.?
2. Who put the red flag?  MTGOX? FBI? CIA? US GOV? JAPAN GOV? WHO?
3. What is the worst case scenario, since the documents I have sent you are temporary but official, the official documents take to be processed by the government 3 to 4 weeks.

When I requested some my funds for compliance you failed me, now I am flat broke since the little money I had it was all spent on compliance, I have spend over $200 on compliance, and I am not sure what else you will want.
I am very tired of all this nonsense, once my money it is freed it is going to my personal wallet and intersango which they seem to understand security, not just claim security.

Answering those 3 questions does not violate any laws, MTGOX  why can you not give an straight answer.

It is very true I made some mistakes, like having the money on an exchange it is a very bad idea, the proper way to use an exchange is trade and then remove the money, have small amount to minimize the risk, and no use a single exchange, but use many exchanges, with more money on the ones providing better service.