stolen bitcoins

[hector3115]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is one of the greatest things about bitcoins.  The stolen coins can be tracked and the spending of them will lead them back to the thief.

Thats something that can definitely not be done with fiat.

[Ume]

The stolen coins can be tracked and the spending of them will lead them back to the thief.

according to this i think u are wrong it cant lead to the thief but yes it can lead to the address to the ADDRESS of thief !! but i see there is no way to caught the thief with an address its very hard !! and if there is too many thief who have enough knowledge about hacking bitcoin address then all the bitcoin will be stolen and no bitcoins left for real users or the real owners of em!

[RodeoX]

As mentioned above we can all see the addresses involved, but addresses are not tied to identity, so we have no idea who owns them.

[Meuh6879]

wrong.


bitmixer.


real economy -all coins will be recycled-

[hector3115]

But at some point, they have to be traded for something of value.  Of course if they sit in an anonymous account forever they won't be caught but when they try to buy things or exchange for fiat at that point they can be tracked down.  Right?

[slacknation]

the bitcoin community do not believe in blacklisting coins and source of coins can be 'washed' such that you can only conclude that the coins sent to you are stolen with some % certainty.

[RodeoX]

That's possible. But what if I send them to a mixing service? That would combine them with other coins until the trail is lost. There are also other ways to obfuscate the coins and make them hard to track.
This is why doing your own security is so important. It is easy to get away with stealing them. In fact, I don't know if anyone has ever been convicted for stealing coins?

[croato]

Bitcoin is fairly new tech and in time will sure find ways to make life harder for thieves and scammers. In my opinion, some sort of regulation is needed if we want btc become mainstream. We cant alow btc is considered as monopoly money and thieves can do what they want doing great deal of dmg to bitcoin and all of us.

[BillyBobZorton]

It would require tremendous effort to track a scammer/criminal, it could be done tho, but whoever wants to do that must have massive resources.
If the scammer used something like Monero then you are shit out of luck.

[Meuh6879]

regulation deserve nothing.
trust and serious job must have reward.

bitcoin is in this way, it's a tangible "store of value".

if bitstamp was hack ... it's because of lack ... or because, they want do more with less.

computer security must be ... used when it's needed.

[ticoti]

no really,because you can mix them and you don't know when they change of owner, so you don't really know who are that bitcoins from

[MCHouston]

I think at some point an address can be tied to a person  Some examples would be:

Pay for lunch with BTC - Cameras/Witnesses
Trading BTC for fiat - Identity is known for Wire Transfers
Buying a TV through NewEgg - Name/Shipping Address
Selling Coins to People - WU has cameras, Loading cards gives places you spent at which have cameras not to mention phone numbers and IP addresses

Pretty much anything that involves you getting a good or a physical service you can be identified.

The only thing I can think of you can do with BTC that is anonymous is trade between coins, make more BTC, and look at them.

Citizens might have a hard time tracking down a person, but law enforcement with warrants and all their other goodies could find people easy enough.

[Aemon]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is one of the greatest things about bitcoins.  The stolen coins can be tracked and the spending of them will lead them back to the thief.

Thats something that can definitely not be done with fiat.

I think that is one of the things that hurt Bitcoins the most.  For the most part, credit cards are easily tracked and you can find out where/who stole your card information pretty easily.  

You can gather the bitcoin address of the people who stole your stuff, but that does you absolutely no good.

[AGD]

If the thief has managed to sell the stolen coins anonymously, there will be no way to track him down. The buyer of the stolen Bitcoins can't be made responsible for the theft (Though I might be checking where these BTC were coming from, before I'd buy them)

[NeuroticFish]

There are mixing services, there are anonymous coins you can buy then sent to another wallet(s) and make your tracks vanish... unfortunately the thieves have more means to hide than 2 years ago.

[bitcoinmaniac52]

yea you can see where they are sent and
"spent" i guess but virtually getting those coins back is like a dream lol , u can use a wallet from some jun k computer at a library and realisticly you would probly never find the man or woman that steal from you. its crazy

[Meuh6879]

(Though I might be checking where these BTC were coming from, before I'd buy them)

  really ? Good luck to fo this ... before or after shipping.
try this with exchange to identify the miner ... 

[crypto97]

Just doesn't make sense to me........21 million out there......5 million stolen
I would think it's as easy as clamping down on the 16 million by tracking their addresses etc. any movement thereafter should raise a red flag?

[Gumbork]

Just doesn't make sense to me........21 million out there......5 million stolen
I would think it's as easy as clamping down on the 16 million by tracking their addresses etc. any movement thereafter should raise a red flag?

5 milion usd worth of btc was stolen, not 5 million bitcoins

[calci]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is one of the greatest things about bitcoins.  The stolen coins can be tracked and the spending of them will lead them back to the thief.

Thats something that can definitely not be done with fiat.

Not in all cases. They can always be passed through a mixer and be sent to random addresses. If they hit an exchange, then becomes harder to trace.