{ANNOUNCEMENT} WBX Exchange Frozen

[repentance]

On a seperate note: I was thinking about claiming internet fraud with the state police. All of you were talking about claiming to the trade authorities - why not just state police? I would say he scammed us, so its Internet fraus as well, isn't it? After all he was not a registered exchange with an exchange licence.

Owing someone money is generally a civil matter and the remedy is seeking a judgement against them which can then be enforced through a number of different ways.

You can certainly make a report to Queensland Police Service, but fraud is a very specific criminal offence and it's a lot more complicated than failing to pay people you owe money.  Yes, WBX was operating without a licence but 1) that was disclosed to customers on the website and 2) the police are not the entity which deals with breaches of licensing requirements.  They are responsible for investigating fraud - including online fraud - but it's not clear that WBX's activities would meet the legal benchmarks for being classified as fraud.

If you believe that WBX was a scam from the start, then Scamwatch is the federal body with whom you should file a report (they're part of the ACCC).

https://www.scamwatch.gov.au/content/index.phtml/tag/reportascam/

Here's a brief summary of Qld law in relation to fraud.

In order for the Police to prove their case at Court, they must prove each of the following matters beyond a reasonable doubt.

1 (a) The accused applied to his or her own use

(i) property belonging to another

(ii) property belonging to the accused, or which is in the accused’s possession, either solely or jointly with another person, subject to a trust, direction or condition or on account of any other person.

“ Applied” means taking or using another’s property for the accused’s own purposes.

Or (b) The accused obtained the property from any person.

“ Obtain” includes to get, gain, receive or acquire in any way (s 408C (3) (e))

Or (c) the accused induced any person to deliver property to any person.

Or (d) The accused gained a benefit or advantage, pecuniary or otherwise, to any person.

Or (e) The accused caused a detriment, pecuniary or otherwise, to any person

Or (f) The accused induced any person to do an act which the person was lawfully entitled to abstain from doing

Or (g) The accused induced any person to abstain from doing an act which the person was lawfully entitled to do

Or (h) the accused made off knowing that payment on the spot was required or expected for property lawfully supplied or returned or any service lawfully provided, without having paid and with intent to avoid payment.

2. The action of the defendant must have been done dishonestly.

To prove the accused acted dishonestly the prosecution must prove that what the defendant did was dishonest by the standards of ordinary honest people and that the defendant realised that what he or she did was dishonest by those standards.

Specific provision in s 408C(b) and (c) in relation to whether an act or omission is dishonest.

It will be necessary for the Police in every offence to prove that the accused was the person who committed the offence. Click here to learn more about identification evidence.

http://www.australiancriminallawyers.com.au/web/page/QLD_Law_Fraud

If you believe that WBX constituted a financial or investment scam, then an ASIC report would also be appropriate.

https://www.moneysmart.gov.au/scams/report-a-scam

Who you report to really depends on what you believe happened.  Do you believe that Andre has misappropriated user funds for his own use or do you believe that he had a bad business model which was doomed to fail from the start?  Do you believe there are any assets which may be available to people owed money by WBX or not?  Do you believe that Andre could pay people but is simply choosing not to?  Intention is extremely relevant if you're going to start throwing around words like "fraud" and scam.

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[PatrickHarnett]

I have no intention of throwing words around, nor will a police complaint achieve the return of funds.  It is a civil matter, not a criminal one.  (However, Mr Jensen may have engaged in criminal activity, but I am not able to make that statement.)

[Seal]

I'm still in need of an address. Anybody have this? What is his wife's business address?

[bitcowok]

...aaaaaaaaand worldbitcoinexchange web site now down.   Hope you all archived your records.

[bitcowok]

And its back again. 

Wonder whats going on there...

[dooglus]

And its back again.  

Wonder whats going on there...

I checked when you wrote that it was down, but it was still up for me.

[scales]

Site news for this year is missing....
Come on Andre, what's going on?

[dooglus]

Site news for this year is missing....
Come on Andre, what's going on?

The orderbook is completely empty too:
  https://www.worldbitcoinexchange.com/?page=orderbook

I think last time I looked, it wasn't.

Edit: my account still exists, but the "you are logged in, but need to become VERIFIED before you can withdraw or Deposit funds" at the top is new.  I used to be "VERIFIED".  So it's not that the database has been completely reset.

[repentance]

The info about it being connected to High Net Worth Property Pty Ltd also seems to have been removed as does the information referring to Andre and Chris and the reference to their location as being "Gold Coast".

[dooglus]

And in the links down the right hand side, where it says "news what's new", etc., it's all bold.  It used to be that the "news" was bold and the "what's new" subtitle wasn't.

This is just weird.  What's going on?

[repentance]

The home which was the registered address of High Net Worth Property Pty Ltd prior to its move to the Gold Coast - almost certainly belonged to one of the directors and probably Andre - was sold in June last year.  

http://www.business.com.au/high-net-worth-property-pty-ltd-/

http://www.realestate.com.au/sold/in-badger+creek,+vic+3777/list-1

[Andre Jensen (World Bitcoin Exchange)]

And in the links down the right hand side, where it says "news what's new", etc., it's all bold.  It used to be that the "news" was bold and the "what's new" subtitle wasn't.

This is just weird.  What's going on?

Hi All

I no longer have full control over the exchange site, a update on the recovery of all exchange member funds, recent correspondence with our banks and the banking ombudsman is the bank is entitled to hold all exchange funds as they were fraudulently taken from bank accounts across the country and deposited into my exchange account, the source of the fraud activity came from Germany a i can't tell you much more than that. 

This being said Chris has the only funds (assets) of the exchange, they will need to be returned to the exchange members.

Thanks Andre   

I will be online for the next hour to answer any questions

[PatrickHarnett]

And in the links down the right hand side, where it says "news what's new", etc., it's all bold.  It used to be that the "news" was bold and the "what's new" subtitle wasn't.

This is just weird.  What's going on?

Hi All

I no longer have full control over the exchange site, a update on the recovery of all exchange member funds, recent correspondence with our banks and the banking ombudsman is the bank is entitled to hold all exchange funds as they were fraudulently taken from bank accounts across the country and deposited into my exchange account, the source of the fraud activity came from Germany a i can't tell you much more than that. 

This being said Chris has the only funds (assets) of the exchange, they will need to be returned to the exchange members.

Thanks Andre   

I will be online for the next hour to answer any questions

I can prove my funds were not fraudulently taken, and simply deposited with you (as you were operating as an individual and not as a company).  I have requested, and do so again here, for contact details with your lawyers or other advisers as you are reluctant to provide information directly.

You will also note I have issued you a notice requiring you to repay the Australian dollars that you hold, or I will  pass the debt to a collection agency as you are personally liable, and the funds involved are not related to bitcoin trading, so easily verifiable.

If you consider this hostile, it should be understandable that across this community there is a lot of money at stake, as I am sure you are aware.

Patrick

[Andre Jensen (World Bitcoin Exchange)]

And in the links down the right hand side, where it says "news what's new", etc., it's all bold.  It used to be that the "news" was bold and the "what's new" subtitle wasn't.

This is just weird.  What's going on?

Hi All

I no longer have full control over the exchange site, a update on the recovery of all exchange member funds, recent correspondence with our banks and the banking ombudsman is the bank is entitled to hold all exchange funds as they were fraudulently taken from bank accounts across the country and deposited into my exchange account, the source of the fraud activity came from Germany a i can't tell you much more than that. 

This being said Chris has the only funds (assets) of the exchange, they will need to be returned to the exchange members.

Thanks Andre   

I will be online for the next hour to answer any questions

I can prove my funds were not fraudulently taken, and simply deposited with you (as you were operating as an individual and not as a company).  I have requested, and do so again here, for contact details with your lawyers or other advisers as you are reluctant to provide information directly.

You will also note I have issued you a notice requiring you to repay the Australian dollars that you hold, or I will  pass the debt to a collection agency as you are personally liable, and the funds involved are not related to bitcoin trading, so easily verifiable.

If you consider this hostile, it should be understandable that across this community there is a lot of money at stake, as I am sure you are aware.

Patrick

Hi PatricK


To be honest mate i have no money to pay you the scammers, banks have taken it all, please provide your lawyers contact details here and i will contact them unfortunately i can't afford to have lawyers represent me anymore.

Thanks Andre

[dooglus]

Andre, when you want me to pay out the remaining bitcoins, please take down the site to prevent further trading of balances between users who have apparently been trading their WBX balances between themselves using "vouchers", then send me a final database dump so I know how much to pay everyone.

Since you revoked my admin account I've been unable to see user balances, so currently have no idea how much each person is owed.

I'll set up a claim site so users can log in with their OpenID and specify a bitcoin address for me to refund the coins to.

Thanks.

[Andre Jensen (World Bitcoin Exchange)]

Hi All,

I would like to remind you all that i was advised by my lawyers(insert: when i had money) to reframe from making any comments in public, this is why i have kept silent until now i am very sorry and it was frustrating for me watching my personal details get posted by users here, some also have mentioned my family which Im not at all happy with you wouldn't like it if i posted your personal info here. ( remember I have your personal info)

Thanks Andre

[dooglus]

Hi All,

I would like to remind you all that i was advised by my lawyers to reframe from making any comments in public, this is why i have kept silent until now i am very sorry and it was frustrating for me watching my personal details get posted by users here, some also have mentioned my family which Im not at all happy with you wouldn't like it if i posted your personal info here. ( I have your info and would like to discuss face to face)

Thanks Andre

So will you be able to provide a database dump so I can pay your users back a part of what they are owed?

[Andre Jensen (World Bitcoin Exchange)]

Andre, when you want me to pay out the remaining bitcoins, please take down the site to prevent further trading of balances between users who have apparently been trading their WBX balances between themselves using "vouchers", then send me a final database dump so I know how much to pay everyone.

Since you revoked my admin account I've been unable to see user balances, so currently have no idea how much each person is owed.

I'll set up a claim site so users can log in with their OpenID and specify a bitcoin address for me to refund the coins to.

Thanks.

Hi Chris

I have no control over the exchange site any more i do recall you doing a database dump when this all happened do you have those files?

Thanks Andre

[dooglus]

Hi Chris

I have no control over the exchange site any more i do recall you doing a database dump when this all happened do you have those files?

Thanks Andre

I have those files.  They're out of date now.  People have since sold their balances debt to other users.

Who currently has control of the site?

[Andre Jensen (World Bitcoin Exchange)]

4. Yes i locked you out as i had to minimise further risk to the Exchange Database and code, sorry Chris its nothing personal i am just protecting my self and WBX client information.

OK, I thought you must have.  Just so you know, I have backups of the site from shortly before you locked me out.  As you know, the hosting company hasn't exactly had a good track record of looking after the server themselves, so I regularly made offsite backups.  That includes encrypted backups of the exchange's bitcoin wallet.  The wallet has a large keypool, so I will have access to any funds that are deposited into the exchange wallet for some time to come.  To properly minimise risk to the exchange I would advise you to transfer the remaining funds from the exchange wallet (less than 1 BTC I think) then start from scratch with a new wallet.

I also still have admin access to the WBX site, so can see client information.  Disable that by setting "is_admin" to 0 for my row in the users table:
  UPDATE users SET is_admin=0 WHERE uid=1001;
or use the web interface to the database.



Hi Chris,

You do have backups right?

Thanks Andre