Topic: Bitcoin adoption and increase in crime rate, how correlated are they?. - page 2. (Read 419 times)

Oh how I miss the good old days, way back before 2009 when there was no crime or poverty. People weren't getting kidnapped, killed, and cut into pieces because their family and friends couldn't afford to pay the ransom. There was no drug trafficking because we didn't have Bitcoin back in those ancient times. Cars were never stolen and sold for parts. Break-ins in houses never happened because there was no Bitcoin to steal. Government officials were fair and uncorrupted. They didn't steal and launder money for their criminal friends and partners because there was no blockchain to move that value around.

And one day some scum invented Bitcoin and our world has been in havoc ever since. Oh, wait! But all those things existed and were committed even before Bitcoin. That must mean that this new technology isn't responsible for the doings of men, and some people are just scum no matter the era they live in or the system they use to get paid.

On a more serious note.
When you hate something, like the government hates Bitcoin, you take advantage of the increased adoption to turn it into something ugly. Bitcoin and all crypto leave a digital trail when used, which makes them less effective than cash, but much better than using banks, credit cards, and various other fiat payment processors. That and there constantly rising valuation is what makes them attractive to common people and criminals alike. 

Bitcoin implements a nominee system, and its transaction details are publicly recorded in the Bitcoin database (blockchain).
If Bitcoin is used in criminal activities, transaction records will always be made public to the public chain. Once the supervision/criminal investigation section traces the connection between any relevant Bitcoin address in the transaction record and the individual/entity, this transaction record will always become criminal evidence.

considering that cryptocurrencies are becoming very popular nowadays, I think some scammers, as well as criminals, will try to take advantage of this. what's more, is that many people think that cryptocurrencies have transactions that are difficult to track. It's very natural that some people use it for the crime. because it's just so popular, it sometimes gets the public's attention, even though they realize that fraud and the biggest crime also happen to fiat.

Apart from that, I think the way to prevent this is for the government to work with exchanges that require KYC for certain withdrawals. I think most people will trade it there, and maybe we can stop the scams or the crimes out from it. although not optimal, but at least it's worth a try.

Just like you already mentioned, I believe that it is just another propaganda to discourage citizens from engaging in Bitcoin because from my little understanding of how crimes and money laundering has been reported in my country from mostly the Government official, ALL and not part of their money stolen from the Countries coffers are not in a single crypto but Fiat. I believe my county now has one of the highest rates of kidnapping and ransom and not a single report has been reported that those ransoms were paid via bitcoin or any form of crypto.
Even though we cannot totally rule out some of these crimes have been perpetrated via Crypto, that does not mean that cryptocurrencies are the reasons for high crimes.

 

Actually even the past years bitcoin are use in lots of crime in other countries thats why its possible to happen that it will increase the crime rate. Bitcoin or other crypto currency getting involved with some crime because they are using it as mode of payment because its untraceable if where or who is the one who sending it to others. Bitcoin used in some illegal activity such as payment to porn site selling drugs etc.

How about on talking about fiat itself on tagging it all along with crime rate or something in correlation to that? Why they would always be mindful about new things and blaming out Bitcoin
on higher or increase rate of crime?

Correlation? Well, on some part I could tell that it is really giving out some part due to anonymity and decentralization which is totally a perfect recipe when it comes to money laundering

but it is really just  right to put up some focus on that part? Government and bullshit media  does really love to focus on things on what they do have in mind.

Just to note, we ought to ask ourselves; why do people involve themselves in crimes at the first place?

This is what really matters than putting the blame on cryptocurrency. I say this because, if these things (answers to the above questions) are tackled, you can be rest assured the world would be a much better place. Crime is bound to abond where there is corruption, injustice, lack of basic amenities, lack of jobs and the necessary conditions for a fair living. These are just a few of the things that should be looked into other than the so called cryptocurrency adoption.

More of the big crimes committed, that has resulted in the taking of one's life in our world today, especially within the third world countries are done using fiat for a payment media. Bitcoin has got little to do with increased crime rate.

I don't read the same as you Brainboss, the article says that with these new coins there has been an increase in scams using them but it doesn't say there is an increase in crime because of that. Some of the crime that was done in fiat may have moved to cryptocurrencies, without increasing crime in general. I don't see an article attacking cryptocurrencies.

On the other hand, even if it wanted to establish a correlation it would take a lot more, remember the supposed relationship between people drowning in swimming pools and movies featuring Nicolas Cage:

For me, bitcoin itself is neutral. And yes, media need something to attract people so they create news that maybe still hype. We all know fiat is used to crime too, and it is not really booming because it is common thing. But actually i am not agree with media too, why they only give people news when something bad is use bitcoin or maybe bad affect on people who use bitcoin. Like in my country when investment in bitcoin is scam, investment in fiat actually a lot too but not booming, or maybe trader who suicide because lose in trading, there are a lot of people who success in trading but not much appeared in media.

The increase in the rate of crime it is based on some traditional indications, perhaps must be updated, well this depends on the countries where it is determined, but some countries do not include the computer crimes, scam schemes based on cryptocurrency, etc.

Specificaly in which if Bitcoin is causing raising these crime rates it is a question of accepting any crime where Bitcoin is involved formally in the statistics.

As for that if in the third world countries there is growth crime for the use of Bitcoin actually this data at countries of the first world are best taken these complaints is at least better documented in the countries called first level.

In any case, the rate for traditional crimes is so tall that it will be very difficult in the short term that based on the cold numbers to determine that in a specific country that rate of criminality increases by the use of Bitcoin.

On purpose there is an index, the GPI (Global Peace Index) where we can see that certain first-class countries are far away from the top.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Peace_Index

Other source: https://www.economicsandpeace.org

Maybe a good hint of "departure" to start a serious study would be focused on the ends of this list and compare results.
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^{Edit: This page shows in detail the global classification:
https://countryeconomy.com/demography/global-peace-index}

I think it is exaggerated to attribute to Bitcoin a certain country's increase in crime rate. I am more than sure that if we are to look closely at individual crimes, the great majority of them don't have anything to do with Bitcoin. In the first place, what percentage of the Venezuelan population is actually involved in Bitcoin?

But I guess there is indeed a new scam modus with the rise of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. But Bitcoin is not to blame for this. As a matter of fact, Bitcoin is also a victim. The technology is useful and has wonderful features and yet it has also earned a negative label due to certain scams. Again, this is not Bitcoin's fault. It is not Bitcoin's fault that it is being used by scammers. You don't blame knives for the rise of stabbing incidents.

How does this is badly related to bitcoin or crypto ?  If the family could not afford to pay the ransom, in bitcoin or in fiat, the result would have been same.
Media is wrongly projecting that if you have bitcoin, you are subjected to ransomware attack which is again misleading.

In order to save yourself from ransomware attack is to properly setup the security of your system so that your system is not compromised. This is the teaching which should have been floating on social media.

I guess it is not clear what are those types of crimes? if it was an internet-based crime will I believe that's true, those crimes are committed ever since, scammers, hackers, etc are freely moved on the internet and that's normal because the internet is open, as I remember in 2016, I became a victim of a scam, driven by so-called Bitcoin investment, and it's pretty common on the internet nowadays, but I believe it happens for a reason, that's why we should take extra precaution before dealing this kind of investment next time.

But if people say that Bitcoin/cryptocurrency adoption is the main cause why? the crime is increasing like street crimes, murder, robbery, etc. for me it's a total nonsense and baseless correlation and it should be ignored for the peace of mind.  

Bitcoin adoption and crime rate increase, how correlated? what is clear is that there are definitely more positives than negatives, as technology advances it is certain that the crime rate will increase, when there is an opportunity sometimes that is where crime occurs, so we are required to always be vigilant, must do everything carefully..

Mainstream media & the status quo will always push bitcoin as bad. They say it’s used for drugs, terrorism, laundering plus a whole host of other things. What do they think fiat is used for too? They’re not stupid, they’re just trying to manipulate average joe into not buying bitcoin. The fiat system is crumbling & bitcoin is the get out. Buy bitcoin, don’t listen to their FUD.

The involvement of crypto in crimes should not be blamed on its existence instead it is the evil deeds of people that should be. It only becomes an effective instrument due to the anonymity and the convenience it gives off to criminals. Crimes are crimes regardless of what tool is being used and at the very first place, bitcoin or crypto's purpose is not to tolerate crimes, it longs for financial freedom for everyone right now and in the future. Not because you are involved in a tool that is being used in crime, it would make you a criminal too, it is the way you use it and how you act up whenever you witness a crime involving crypto.

There is nothing else to say except that there is no logic to blame the tool, but the one who uses it. Crime has always existed, and drug + kidnappings are very popular in South America - and the fact that a criminal came up with the idea to demand a ransom in cryptocurrency only shows that they are also following new technologies. However, their intelligence is not very high if they only require Bitcoin, and they avoid crypto which has a much higher level of anonymity, so they would get a better chance that they will not be caught.

It is quite evident that cryptocurrencies are much more dangerous in the online world, but this is only a consequence of the fact that a large part of people who use the Internet are quite naive and do not have any basic knowledge about computers/online security.

Countries with a low standard of living will always have a high crime rate - and criminals will always use what is available to them. The fact is that cryptocurrencies will also become part of that system, but I do not believe that they will become dominant when it comes to criminal activities in the near future.

Looking at the perspective mate , I think that crime will increase whenever there are increase also in the demand and the prices of cryptocurrency specially the popularity of bitcoin nowadays are doubled and this lures the bad element to find another way of illegal activities entering the crypto or cyber world in which there are newbies and not so familiar individual that jumping also in this market.

with those ideas surely there are only two things will come and this is more victims and more income from the crime provider.

media are born to make profit to their company nothing caring about what is the truth and what will be the future but instead they are here to bring false statement s and wrong news .

Well, in the first place, it's a pretty stupid and weak argument once one actually looked towards the deeper reasons as to why scams occur. It's actually easy to make most people shut up when they reason this out tbh, are scams, robberies, kidnapping, and whatnot non-existent in the first place when crypto wasn't here? That single line is enough imo. It's simply a new method that criminals ask to be paid in, but not necessarily the cause for people to actually commit crimes. Crypto is a bloody medium, it's certainly not something that people fight over for like resources such as food and water. It's like saying people kill because they use a knife, my Parents would be a killer then ngl.

Let me start by saying that it actually seems that in Venezuela, the homicide rate is decreasing over the last few years, whereas Bitcoin is getting more and more popular worldwide. Also, if we look at Western Europe, or the US, the homicide rate has been decreasing since the 90s. So there's no correlation here at all, actually, as the crime is getting less frequent, while Bitcoin popularity is growing. But even if there were a correlation as simple as both parameters increasing over time, it would mean nothing it terms of their causation. For instance, if there were increasingly more killings in Venezuela (or worldwide), and the global tea consumption were on the rise, one could make a similar manipulation that drinking tea causes more violence, which is ridiculous. Same goes for Bitcoin and crime.