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Topic: Bitcoin and illegal activities - page 3. (Read 355 times)

hero member
Activity: 2170
Merit: 528
March 24, 2020, 08:10:27 PM
#13
If it's really 1 or 2% then it's much less than fiat. Cash has always been the choice of criminals especially drug lords. Pablo Escobar had millions of dollars buried in the fields behind his houses and hidden inside walls.

The Dollar is the currency behind everything illegal. Bitcoin doesn't even compare to that.
hero member
Activity: 2338
Merit: 757
March 24, 2020, 07:58:38 PM
#12
Cryptocurrencies can never be compared with ordinary fiat money in this matter in terms of volume, although we can often hear about various crimes with cryptocurrencies, this is mainly fraud, although transfers to various drug cartels and terrorists are also quite common.
This is far to be compared. Criminal activities are required to use the most anonymous method they find in the market. However, criminals represent just a little portion from the total number of bitcoin users.
hero member
Activity: 1932
Merit: 622
March 24, 2020, 07:48:04 PM
#11
I think we need more sources to validate the data above. And we need a longer time period to ensure the conclusion, not only from 2017-2019. I think we need more data before 2017, it should also be involved to get complete data. However, I am pretty sure that the percentage of illegal activities using Bitcoin isn't as much as haters said. They just did it to make a bad reputation for Bitcoin and crypto. Although they sometimes said with great confidence, we know that they don't have valid data.  Grin  
sr. member
Activity: 2506
Merit: 368
March 24, 2020, 07:43:25 PM
#10
The source is quite unreliable though but I'll give it a credit for that although most of these numbers are not really the right number as I was expecting. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are already one of the source of these criminal activities around the globe and I think it is not just only in cryptocurrencies since there are wide scams in fiat too such as the investment scam also known as hyip.
hero member
Activity: 742
Merit: 507
March 24, 2020, 07:30:55 PM
#9
Cryptocurrencies can never be compared with ordinary fiat money in this matter in terms of volume, although we can often hear about various crimes with cryptocurrencies, this is mainly fraud, although transfers to various drug cartels and terrorists are also quite common.
legendary
Activity: 1134
Merit: 1597
March 24, 2020, 07:18:09 PM
#8
Take the USD for a second and imagine it was 100% transparent and anyone could fully analyze anyone's wallet. How much USD and fiat overall do you think is used in illegal activities? I'll tell you it's a ton of money and fiat is still alive and doing well overall (ignoring the pandemic and economical downfall).

Same goes for jewelry and precious metals. You can't really compare how BTC is used for illicit activity with fiat because fiat doesn't have an entire damn history of where every single penny has been. This "BTC is used by criminals" shit is old and utter bullshit. Anything is used by criminals and they'll never cease to exist.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1100
Leading Crypto Sports Betting & Casino Platform
March 24, 2020, 05:58:17 PM
#7
I think it is very difficult to estimate how many crimes are committed involving bitcoin, I do not know how genius these people are who did this research. But in my honest opinion I think that on the dark web people prefer to use more bitcoin and if we had a precise number we would be shocked. Don't get me wrong, I like bitcoin and I need to be clear that the problem is not in bitcoin, the problem is in people
sr. member
Activity: 1988
Merit: 275
March 24, 2020, 05:47:04 PM
#6
The anonymous advantage of bitcoin is what makes it look like a shady activity enabled because fiat can't really do such an activities otherwise it would be labelled as money laundering. However, whether genuine businesses thrive with both or not, some people have zeroed their minds on a negative outcome and not for positive but for me, I look at the positive which is that it is convenient to transact whenever you are.

I can agree with that, the ease of transaction is mainly the advantage for me when you are talking crypto. Based from the OP's graph, the large contributing part are scams and I think that's true. So many crap and scam projects, promising overwhelming returns, etc. but they will disappear once they got their money. This is the sad reality in crypto. But they are lessening now as less and less investors are joining these ICOs, IEOs, STOs or whatever your call it and especially now that we are in crisis. I hope these crap projects will be gone forever.
hero member
Activity: 2478
Merit: 621
Leading Crypto Sports Betting & Casino Platform
March 24, 2020, 05:42:12 PM
#5
The anonymous advantage of bitcoin is what makes it look like a shady activity enabled because fiat can't really do such an activities otherwise it would be labelled as money laundering. However, whether genuine businesses thrive with both or not, some people have zeroed their minds on a negative outcome and not for positive but for me, I look at the positive which is that it is convenient to transact whenever you are.
hero member
Activity: 1806
Merit: 671
March 24, 2020, 05:41:37 PM
#4
If this was true then it is absolutely ridiculous to think on why the government is always pinpointing the criminal activities involved in the crypto industry as if it was the biggest concern on as acting out a vehicle for crimes to happen. The funny thing about this one is they always left out scams when they are talking about illicit activities they always focus more on money laundering and tax evasion and drug payments and nothing about scams that victimize people within the the industry. It really makes you wonder on why they are pushing on things they really don't know about yet they act as if it is the main threat on the criminal world. Lets just hope this analysis becomes mainstream so that these politicians would shut their mouth about crypto being a tool for crime.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1330
Slava Ukraini!
March 24, 2020, 05:35:12 PM
#3
If these numbers are real, 1.1% is almost nothing. I have no idea how they made this research, but I thought that these numbers would be much bigger, maybe between 10%-20%. But I think that these numbers might be a bit bigger than just 1.1% because some illegal activities might be hidden by mixers (unless it's also counted in this research). Also, often there is simply now way how they can know that these BTC were used for bad purpose.
But even if these stats aren't 100% accurate, it blows stereotype that one of the main use of Bitcoin is illegal activities.
Probably fiat cash have much bigger rate Smiley.
hero member
Activity: 2870
Merit: 594
March 24, 2020, 05:11:37 PM
#2
It's pretty obvious though, you just have to look at the recent scams that PlusToken has pulled-off, which roughly to be estimated around $2 billion worth of crypto's including BTC, ETH, USDT and OMG.

And then we have the usual scams, fake-giveaways and now, cyber criminals are using the covid-19 hysteria to jump on and take advantage of people's emotions. I'm sure the community is doing everything to warn people of a possible scam, but I guess the market is really big that it is hard to cover, plus we still have a lot of gullible people, who also thinks that they are smarter and can get easy money. But they really don't know that scammers are really out there, trying to lure and milk them in which every way they can.
full member
Activity: 202
Merit: 180
It's precious, protect it!
March 24, 2020, 04:35:28 PM
#1
Most of us always question if bitcoin is the best refuge for criminals and scammers and activities such as stealing funds, money laundering, terrorism financing and all sort of illegal activities.

The reality is that a total of 11.5$ billion worth of cryptocurrencies were associated with criminal activity which represents only 1.1% of cryptocurrencies transaction volume in 2019  according to chainalysis. The graphic below tells us that the most common type of crimes is not money laundering nor terrorism financing, it is the act which we all see every day: scamming.

Share us your thought about this matter and if someone knows any other resource that can give us a more detailed view, please provide it.

Edit: moving the topic to Beginner section for more help.


source: https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/cryptocurrency-crime-2020-report
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