Bitmain now requiring KYC documentation to buy hardware

pinkflower

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Quote from: leopard2 on August 28, 2018, 08:40:37 PM

It has never been clearer why ASIC resistant coins are the way to go.

This is just another step towards Stalinism and away from Satoshis original idea; if miners need to KYC there is no point in crypto anymore. Angry

Yeah, thats why I keep saying to people in the forum to support Burst and Proof of Capacity. Its going to show the community in general that mining using your hard drives is the real democratic way to mine a cryptocurrency because the hardware is cheap and easily bought for everyone.

If you dont like Burst, theres a new cryptocurrency called Chia by Bram Cohen which has the same idea almost.

leopard2

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It has never been clearer why ASIC resistant coins are the way to go.

This is just another step towards Stalinism and away from Satoshis original idea; if miners need to KYC there is no point in crypto anymore. Angry

pinkflower

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Quote from: ?? on ??

Quote from: 1Referee on August 26, 2018, 07:24:46 AM

Quote from: ?? on ??

if bitcoin or any major cryptocurrency (which use PoW and can be mined with ASIC) community want to change to PoW "resistant" algorithm, that would hurt Bitmain (along with other ASIC manufacture) significantly.
If 51%+ of mining hashrate comes from Bitmain's pool or ASIC, i'm sure there will be boycott attempt.

Smaller coins could relatively easily change their fundamentals, but that's unlikely to happen in Bitcoin's case, especially when there is no reason to do so.

I agree, however the idea PoW algorithm or consensus method change has been around for a while (even though at best it stays as proposal) and IMO Bitmain might be reason if they even have 50%+ on ASIC marketshare.

Quote from: 1Referee on August 26, 2018, 07:24:46 AM

Bitmain needs Bitcoin, for that single reason they won't ever attempt to directly harm it.

At least for now, even though IMO they indirectly harm Bitcoin.

Quote from: pinkflower on August 27, 2018, 12:11:20 AM

Quote from: not.you on August 23, 2018, 01:54:23 PM

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

One reason can be regulatory pressure or the anticipation of regulatory pressure. But this is good for Bitmain mining resellers. They can do the KYC requirements to order the hardware themselves and sell with a margin on everyone who doesnt want to give up their identity.

I'm sure you can't hide your identity just by buy from 3rd party, unless it's done person-to-person (not though marketplace such as eBay).

I wasnt talking about Ebay. But you are right, no one can hide online privacy in full, but you can set up a mining equipment webshop that doesnt ask for KYC/AML documents. If buyers dont want to give up their documents to Bitmain then they have to buy from your webshop.

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Quote from: BitHodler on August 27, 2018, 06:24:41 PM

The biggest threat to Bitmain in the very short term is a collapse of Bcash without artificial buy support. I wonder when Jihan will start to use his own Bitcoins to support the price when Bitmain no longer can afford to do it.

I find the whole thing incomprehensible. I don't see how someone can be that blinkered they'd throw large amounts of their own money at it.

Coerce others into burning their own money by all means. That's where their power and resources should've been solely directed - witness the fucking with the hashrate around difficulty adjustments and making companies like Bitpay into BCH bitches, but any one entity/faction singlehandedly trying to prop up a market is pure suicide.

I guess by the end of the year we'll see what's what but it seems like a very strange and amateurish move on their part.

BitHodler

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Quote from: gentlemand on August 27, 2018, 04:50:33 PM

You sure about that? They're looking distinctly wobbly compared to the past. Their IPO thing is fraying by the minute, their main miner is a couple of years old now, they bet a huge amount on Bcash and other companies are starting to emerge.

Well, despite all that they can't yet be bothered by any other player within this industry for the time being, but I agree that their market share is shrinking and will continue to shrink with how other players flow in and gain share.

Bitmain's bet on Bcash is a necessity with how there is next to no legit depth in any of the orderbooks. They used their Bitcoins to remain a ratio of 1/10 but it failed to hold and it tanked to below 0.08BTC this month.

The biggest threat to Bitmain in the very short term is a collapse of Bcash without artificial buy support. I wonder when Jihan will start to use his own Bitcoins to support the price when Bitmain no longer can afford to do it.

gentlemand

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Quote from: BitHodler on August 25, 2018, 05:53:45 PM

Bitmain is probably the most hated entity within this industry, but yet they are still growing and generate more sales than ever before. I don't think any form of boycott will inflict damage on their business.

You sure about that? They're looking distinctly wobbly compared to the past. Their IPO thing is fraying by the minute, their main miner is a couple of years old now, they bet a huge amount on Bcash and other companies are starting to emerge.

Their moment as the absolute dominant force they are may have passed with can only be a good thing for everyone.

As for this KYC stuff, what if someone buys it in bits? Is it a bit like a mining chip and guns and their lower receiver?

pinkflower

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Quote from: not.you on August 23, 2018, 01:54:23 PM

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

One reason can be regulatory pressure or the anticipation of regulatory pressure. But this is good for Bitmain mining resellers. They can do the KYC requirements to order the hardware themselves and sell with a margin on everyone who doesnt want to give up their identity.

BitBerau

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They're doing this due to their IPO coming up.. Regardless I'd rule out buying from bitmain, theres quite a bit of competition now.

1Referee

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Quote from: ?? on ??

if bitcoin or any major cryptocurrency (which use PoW and can be mined with ASIC) community want to change to PoW "resistant" algorithm, that would hurt Bitmain (along with other ASIC manufacture) significantly.
If 51%+ of mining hashrate comes from Bitmain's pool or ASIC, i'm sure there will be boycott attempt.

Smaller coins could relatively easily change their fundamentals, but that's unlikely to happen in Bitcoin's case, especially when there is no reason to do so.

If you have been following Bitmain's (BTC & Antpool's) network share in the last months, they have done everything they could to reduce dominance of their pools, and that's the only proper way to deal with this situation. Bitmain knows better than anyone how destructive it is for them to let their pools grow endlessly. Perfect example of that is how endless growth resulted in the downfall of GHash.IO back in the days.

Bitmain needs Bitcoin, for that single reason they won't ever attempt to directly harm it.

timerland

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It's interesting that they are having two different standards.

If you are a "domestic" user (which I'm assuming is a user from the country that they're operating from, China), then you're apparently still allowed to purchase up to 300,000 RMB. While if you're an international user, you can't purchase without verification anymore. If anyone knows why this is the case, please let me know.

But this is definitely just reflective of the entire regulatory environment of cryptos in general - regulators are quite hostile towards bitcoin at the moment and this attitude isn't really changing any time soon. You can buy anything else on the web without any KYC, yet when it comes to miners, you need KYC. Imagine if you had to get groceries using KYC in the future. Absurd, right? There is no legit reason why mining equipment should be treated differently.

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KYC's goal is to keep bad things happening someday, nowadays many people freely create accounts and most of these accounts die so that with KYC it makes the database more actual and does not contain useless data.

magneto

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No idea why you should be asked for ID for purchase of a good.

Apparently, it's because of mounting regulatory pressure from the country which they are running from, which is understandable. The regulation of crypto businesses and markets are happening on a massive scale at the moment, and that basically means stricter KYC across the board.

If it was actually the regulators asking them to do this, then it's totally understandable that Bitmain is taking this step to prevent them from being flagged as a business. But I don't really see anyone else doing this, especially if you're just trading hardware P2P.

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Quote from: not.you on August 23, 2018, 01:54:23 PM

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

Don't even aware that they do already impose KYC when buying out their hardware. This would really give a big significant effect on their sales.We do understand that they do follow government rules
but I don't see this would really be good into their company.Inspite on having a very unprofitable mining business nowadays and you would add up struggle on purchasing miners then I do foresaw on what would happen.

BitHodler

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Quote from: Patatas on August 24, 2018, 05:04:43 PM

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy. They will change it or will be replaced by another company which doesn't enforce such policies. It's really upto the people to decide how to go about a government tactic. Evey exchange has started to ask for verifications and everybody is doing it you see, the government did their thing but it's only upto the masses to decide if they would abide or boycott it.

Bitmain is probably the most hated entity within this industry, but yet they are still growing and generate more sales than ever before. I don't think any form of boycott will inflict damage on their business.

I think that that people and businesses buying hardware from Bitmain will just cope with the KYC requirements since their potential mining rewards have more priority than their personal information.

Another thing is that verification is a one time event. After their initial verification process they won't be bothered with more verification requests. In other words, people's "sin" will no longer follow them everywhere.

jackg

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Quote from: figmentofmyass on August 25, 2018, 02:12:40 PM

Quote from: Kemarit on August 23, 2018, 05:47:28 PM

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

that's the biggest reason i avoid KYC in this space. i only have documents on file with one exchange, and i sure as hell am not giving documents to bitmain---they were already hacked last year and had customer information compromised! (not that i'm a miner anyway)

Quote from: Patatas on August 24, 2018, 05:04:43 PM

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy.

how does KYC work for corporate clients? many large miners may not care at all.

it's up to the market. last i checked, miners from GMO and others still can't compete with bitmain. this is some additional incentive to go elsewhere, but i dunno if it's enough to make a real difference. unfortunately, people tend to sacrifice their privacy and just get on with their business as usual.

I think anyone related to Bitcoin will have an issue with this. They might have lost a large number of those clients when they limited sale items per batch to 10.

No one answered my other question, we don't know their identities. Last time I sent an email to their support, the replies called themselves "1". I know there's only one person on the help desk but still...

Why not just use the Chinese site and a translation engine (other than Google translate).

figmentofmyass

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Quote from: Kemarit on August 23, 2018, 05:47:28 PM

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

that's the biggest reason i avoid KYC in this space. i only have documents on file with one exchange, and i sure as hell am not giving documents to bitmain---they were already hacked last year and had customer information compromised! (not that i'm a miner anyway)

Quote from: Patatas on August 24, 2018, 05:04:43 PM

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy.

how does KYC work for corporate clients? many large miners may not care at all.

it's up to the market. last i checked, miners from GMO and others still can't compete with bitmain. this is some additional incentive to go elsewhere, but i dunno if it's enough to make a real difference. unfortunately, people tend to sacrifice their privacy and just get on with their business as usual.

1Referee

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Quote from: erk on August 24, 2018, 05:26:19 PM

That sounds so wrong, what's next nVidia asking for KYC to purchase a video card?

You're not far off. If you look at the main intention of governments, which is to localize every purchaser of crypto, then miners are just as much of a target as those who buy crypto through centralized exchanges. In the end it's all about the control governments want to obtain over what they consider to be a dangerous vehicle.

I can totally see a time where if you want to buy more than three GPU's from the same reseller that you have to verify yourself. Just think about it, what's the easiest way to obtain crypto without buying it and without sacrificing your personal information? It's mining. It's somewhat of a loophole governments want to make less easy to exploit.

If people think this is bad already, then wait for what has to come in the forthcoming years.

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Quote from: jackg on August 24, 2018, 02:44:12 PM

Quote from: buwaytress on August 24, 2018, 01:00:38 PM

OK, this is new to me. I can't see any non-commercial reason for requiring (as opposed to wanting) KYC procedures.

Quote from: BitMaxz on August 23, 2018, 02:58:12 PM

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Would seem to be counter-intuitive. GDPR's actually resulted in de-risking from most companies and organisations. GDPR simply means companies requiring data to have to state a justification for it and then to prove that they have all the compliance measures in place. If cookie management is already a hard enough task for most websites to manage (I actually haven't seen a single crypto website already GDPR compliant), why would they want to go a step farther? All that data controller obligations with requesting KYC will kill them.

Localbitcoins recently appended a particularly MASSIVE gdpr compliant privacy policy as far as I can remember.

The funny thing is, my banks don't have a gdpr compliance, they're still happy sharing all of my information with everyone as much as they want to :-) (for credit scores and such)...

Yes, and that's because Localbitcoins has an existing need for KYC, it handles so much transactions and harbours so much data that they can't actually derisk unless they outsource or decentralise the request of and storage of personal data - which doesn't anyway completely cut them off from GDPR obligations (it doesn't make them the data controller but it still makes them responsible for monitoring the controller). It still doesn't make sense in Bitmain's case, although the SEC's requirements for them to step up would make some rationale.

And yeah, none of my banks seem to have upgraded their privacy policies. They might feel safer though, as banks already have cause for requesting and storing data thanks to coexisting AML directives.

Steamtyme

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Regardless of how many home/small miners run from this they will be fine. The massive Data Centers ordering units by the 1000 have no issuie providing KYC info, as they are running massive operations and to reap the benefits as such are already transparent with their government and any other business they deal with. Those orders alone could sustain the business. Not to mention they like to make their gear for themselves to use anyways.

I wonder if they'll apply this to people who want to mine on their pool? That would be interesting as that is a massive revenue stream for them due to uneducated miners.

Quote from: leowonderful on August 23, 2018, 05:53:27 PM

I like eBay, but you get charged a pretty hefty premium for buying ASICs most of the time compared to buying direct or from this forum, especially when the market's going upwards.
That brings me to another point- in Computer Hardware*snip*

Agreed on both fronts. I still check ebay from time to time, but it's been a while since I've had to go there over using the marketplace. It's nice knowing it's there as I did manage to earn a few extra bucks during th eFOM on ebay.

Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 06:08:25 PM

you can get miners pretty cheap if you buy them in multiples.*snip* 10 antminter S9s for £4100 which were seven months old in my mind is a bargain.

Sounds to me like you should check out cryptouniverse, sorry for assuming your continent of origin based on the monetary symbols used.

Also I would suggest looking into their Canaan products as opposed to the S9's.

erk

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That sounds so wrong, what's next nVidia asking for KYC to purchase a video card?

Patatas

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Quote from: BitHodler on August 24, 2018, 04:48:11 PM

It's somewhat of a joke the way you put it, but we're definitely heading towards a state where everything we do gets taxed one way or another, especially when it concerns crypto currencies.

It's in your hands to stop it. For instance, people should just stop buying Bitmain miners and make the company suffer a drastic loss in the business due to their new KYC policy. They will change it or will be replaced by another company which doesn't enforce such policies. It's really upto the people to decide how to go about a government tactic. Evey exchange has started to ask for verifications and everybody is doing it you see, the government did their thing but it's only upto the masses to decide if they would abide or boycott it.

BitHodler

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Quote from: Conasse on August 24, 2018, 04:09:13 PM

Soon you will need a KYC verification to be allowed to breathe and you will have to pay a VAT Roll Eyes

It's somewhat of a joke the way you put it, but we're definitely heading towards a state where everything we do gets taxed one way or another, especially when it concerns crypto currencies.

Bitmain is an easy target for authorities due to their size and dominant position within this industry. In a way they have grown far into the altcoin market as well, which is a plus for authorities since it's considered a win win situation.

By subjecting one entity to KYC they cover a massive part of this industry. That's what centralization does when there's no proper competition to challenge Bitmain. I hope it will change in the next few years.

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Soon you will need a KYC verification to be allowed to breathe and you will have to pay a VAT Roll Eyes

jackg

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Quote from: buwaytress on August 24, 2018, 01:00:38 PM

OK, this is new to me. I can't see any non-commercial reason for requiring (as opposed to wanting) KYC procedures.

Quote from: BitMaxz on August 23, 2018, 02:58:12 PM

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Would seem to be counter-intuitive. GDPR's actually resulted in de-risking from most companies and organisations. GDPR simply means companies requiring data to have to state a justification for it and then to prove that they have all the compliance measures in place. If cookie management is already a hard enough task for most websites to manage (I actually haven't seen a single crypto website already GDPR compliant), why would they want to go a step farther? All that data controller obligations with requesting KYC will kill them.

Localbitcoins recently appended a particularly MASSIVE gdpr compliant privacy policy as far as I can remember.

The funny thing is, my banks don't have a gdpr compliance, they're still happy sharing all of my information with everyone as much as they want to :-) (for credit scores and such)...

buwaytress

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OK, this is new to me. I can't see any non-commercial reason for requiring (as opposed to wanting) KYC procedures.

Quote from: BitMaxz on August 23, 2018, 02:58:12 PM

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Would seem to be counter-intuitive. GDPR's actually resulted in de-risking from most companies and organisations. GDPR simply means companies requiring data to have to state a justification for it and then to prove that they have all the compliance measures in place. If cookie management is already a hard enough task for most websites to manage (I actually haven't seen a single crypto website already GDPR compliant), why would they want to go a step farther? All that data controller obligations with requesting KYC will kill them.

hugeblack

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Quote from: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/99n8g3/in_case_you_didnt_read_it_the_sec_disapproved_the/

The SEC disapproved the ETF because "unidentifiable participants can influence the market". If someone manipulates the broad Bitcoin market, the SEC requires that they be identifiable.

Perhaps this is one of the reasons; there are a lot of investigations being done to make sure that prices not manipulated.

The acceptance of bitcoin as a currency means that the identity of the influential players must be disclosed.

In the future, all platforms will be subject to identity verification "KYC," and therefore the only way to get the Bitcoin anonymously is by mining.
Will be narrowing the purchase of mining tools and companies that make it so do not be surprised by such news.

jackg

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Quote from: ABCbits on August 23, 2018, 09:46:24 PM

Looks like people bad speculation about ASIC (such as https://getmonero.org/2018/02/11/PoW-change-and-key-reuse.html) might become true if other company also ~~follow~~ forced to use KYC requirement.
I wouldn't surprised if their new ASIC also have backdoor just like Antbleed.

Hopefully other mining manufacture will make ASIC with open-source firmware/OS without KYC requirement or Bitcoin (or any PoW based cryptocurrency which can be mined with ASIC) community will be forced to use ASIC "resistant" PoW algorithm.

Is there a list of identities from the people who work at Bitmain?
If not, they might just be using this as a way to make more money by selling peoples' identity infromation on...

Quote from: leowonderful on August 23, 2018, 06:29:07 PM

I don't have the money to invest in multiple miners at once, but from the few bulk listings I've seen on eBay, your observations seem correct. Only thing is I don't see a lot of bulk sales on eBay for miners in the US, but that may just be me not filtering through single-miner and spam listings enough.

As for the Dragonmints (at least for the T1s), they seem reasonably reliable according to this thread, and MyRig's offering repair and servicing for them. I've used MyRig for repairs in the past, and they've always done their job quick, and I had around 99.7% uptime for the hosted S7 I had with them a while back that mined with Kano's pool. One downside with the T1s is that they only work on pools supporting Asicboost, such as Slushpool, Ckpool and Bitminter, so you're limited on the number of pools you can use. Other than that, they're a decent alternative to Bitmain miners.

Slush's pool should still earn you a similar amount to bitmain? (less blocks found but less hashing power also so you don't have to share as much).

I'm thinking of getting at least two and pointing one at a pool and one at my own node, other than installing the stratum server is there anything special I need to do do you think to support asicboost?

ABCbits

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Looks like people bad speculation about ASIC (such as https://getmonero.org/2018/02/11/PoW-change-and-key-reuse.html) might become true if other company also ~~follow~~ forced to use KYC requirement.
I wouldn't surprised if their new ASIC also have backdoor just like Antbleed.

Hopefully other mining manufacture will make ASIC with open-source firmware/OS without KYC requirement or Bitcoin (or any PoW based cryptocurrency which can be mined with ASIC) community will be forced to use ASIC "resistant" PoW algorithm.

TryNinja

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More info about the new KYC requirement:

Source: https://twitter.com/CryptoApostle/status/1032649076112744448

Patatas

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Quote from: not.you on August 23, 2018, 01:54:23 PM

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

Holy Shit! Seems like we will have an era where you need to submit your KYC to buy doughnuts using bitcoins! Are there any alternatives? I hope another Chinese company starts selling their 2nd copy miners on alibaba.com.

Quote from: Kemarit on August 23, 2018, 05:47:28 PM

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

You can't do anything, assuming it's the government that asked bitmain to do so and not their will to add the KYC policy.

not.you

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Quote from: shield132 on August 23, 2018, 04:50:46 PM

Hmm, I have no idea why do they need it. Ebay and amazon doesn't ask for any type of documents so why the hell does Bitmain need them?

Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 03:16:00 PM

Well, bye bitmain. I was going to try to buy from you, now I'll switch to other companies...

Can you tell me which companies are you going to buy from? I am looking for any company which sells bitmain products but can't trust any of them. The reason of this is Bitmain's bad support and shipping. Another option I can see is Baikal Miner. As far as I know they don't ask for KYC as for now.

I haven't used them but there are resellers like blokforge.

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Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 06:08:25 PM

Quote from: leowonderful on August 23, 2018, 05:53:27 PM

I like eBay, but you get charged a pretty hefty premium for buying ASICs most of the time compared to buying direct or from this forum, especially when the market's going upwards.

That brings me to another point- in Computer Hardware, it's possible to buy all kinds of computer parts and ASICs. I've done lots of deals there, and you'll be safe as long as you use a trusted escrow while purchasing miners. I often find great deals for miners and parts there, and the only potential downside is that most sellers only accept BTC or alts as payment.

From what i've noticed, and I shouldn't be saying this because this is what I'm planning on doing, you can get miners pretty cheap if you buy them in multiples. 1 miner on it's own might sell for £550 in an auction, ten miners together recently sold on there for only £4100 which is a massive discount on what it could be and 10 antminter S9s for £4100 which were seven months old in my mind is a bargain.

You can afford for two miners to fail at that price.

There looks to be other miners like the dragonmint which look promising (providing they actually work as advertised)...

I don't have the money to invest in multiple miners at once, but from the few bulk listings I've seen on eBay, your observations seem correct. Only thing is I don't see a lot of bulk sales on eBay for miners in the US, but that may just be me not filtering through single-miner and spam listings enough.

As for the Dragonmints (at least for the T1s), they seem reasonably reliable according to this thread, and MyRig's offering repair and servicing for them. I've used MyRig for repairs in the past, and they've always done their job quick, and I had around 99.7% uptime for the hosted S7 I had with them a while back that mined with Kano's pool. One downside with the T1s is that they only work on pools supporting Asicboost, such as Slushpool, Ckpool and Bitminter, so you're limited on the number of pools you can use. Other than that, they're a decent alternative to Bitmain miners.

jackg

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Quote from: leowonderful on August 23, 2018, 05:53:27 PM

I like eBay, but you get charged a pretty hefty premium for buying ASICs most of the time compared to buying direct or from this forum, especially when the market's going upwards.

That brings me to another point- in Computer Hardware, it's possible to buy all kinds of computer parts and ASICs. I've done lots of deals there, and you'll be safe as long as you use a trusted escrow while purchasing miners. I often find great deals for miners and parts there, and the only potential downside is that most sellers only accept BTC or alts as payment.

From what i've noticed, and I shouldn't be saying this because this is what I'm planning on doing, you can get miners pretty cheap if you buy them in multiples. 1 miner on it's own might sell for £550 in an auction, ten miners together recently sold on there for only £4100 which is a massive discount on what it could be and 10 antminter S9s for £4100 which were seven months old in my mind is a bargain.

You can afford for two miners to fail at that price.

There looks to be other miners like the dragonmint which look promising (providing they actually work as advertised)...

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Bitcoin FTW!

I like eBay, but you get charged a pretty hefty premium for buying ASICs most of the time compared to buying direct or from this forum, especially when the market's going upwards.

That brings me to another point- in Computer Hardware, it's possible to buy all kinds of computer parts and ASICs. I've done lots of deals there, and you'll be safe as long as you use a trusted escrow while purchasing miners. I often find great deals for miners and parts there, and the only potential downside is that most sellers only accept BTC or alts as payment.

Kemarit

legendary

Activity: 3080

Merit: 1353

So Bitmain shoot their own foot by enforcing KYC now. Perhaps its time for GMO of Japan to step up with their manufacturing of their own Bitcoin mining hardware. Might be related to IPO, but what if our/your data is compromised and leaked?

jackg

copper member

Activity: 2856

Merit: 3071

https://bit.ly/387FXHi lightning theory

Quote from: shield132 on August 23, 2018, 04:50:46 PM

Hmm, I have no idea why do they need it. Ebay and amazon doesn't ask for any type of documents so why the hell does Bitmain need them?

Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 03:16:00 PM

Well, bye bitmain. I was going to try to buy from you, now I'll switch to other companies...

Can you tell me which companies are you going to buy from? I am looking for any company which sells bitmain products but can't trust any of them. The reason of this is Bitmain's bad support and shipping. Another option I can see is Baikal Miner. As far as I know they don't ask for KYC as for now.

I was going to try to test the waters with ebay, otherwise, I'd turn to either bitfury or bw. Afaik BW are still producing miners and I could build something from the chips bitfury sell (or get part of a blockbox - they don't look like they've sold very well).

Quote from: AdolfinWolf on August 23, 2018, 03:40:54 PM

For example, https://www.antbleed.com/

Which has just opened up the market for custom software to be made to run on those miners...

shield132

hero member

Activity: 2352

Merit: 905

Metawin.com - Truly the best casino ever

Hmm, I have no idea why do they need it. Ebay and amazon doesn't ask for any type of documents so why the hell does Bitmain need them?

Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 03:16:00 PM

Well, bye bitmain. I was going to try to buy from you, now I'll switch to other companies...

Can you tell me which companies are you going to buy from? I am looking for any company which sells bitmain products but can't trust any of them. The reason of this is Bitmain's bad support and shipping. Another option I can see is Baikal Miner. As far as I know they don't ask for KYC as for now.

AdolfinWolf

legendary

Activity: 1946

Merit: 1427

I'm actually surprised that they haven't done this earlier.

From a legal prosecutor's point of view, these miners could be used by individuals to launder massive amounts of money. (Just like a lot of Cloud mining contracts are.)
(Which would/could make them look pretty bad when holding an IPO.)

Note that i don't actually support this, nor do i support Bitmain after i further read up on them & their scandals.

For example, https://www.antbleed.com/

Quote from: jackg on August 23, 2018, 03:16:00 PM

Well, bye bitmain. I was going to try to buy from you, now I'll switch to other companies...

Too bad that they almost have a monopoly...

~~~~
It's pretty funny that they're doing an IPO holding almost a billion $ of Bcash that they will never be able to sell due to limited liquidity.. Makes their reasoning for it pretty clear.

Quote from: https://twitter.com/Excellion/status/1028426579158884352/photo/1

According to the Bitmain pre-IPO investor deck, they sold most of their #Bitcoin for #Bcash. At $900/BCH, they've bled half a billion in the last 3 months. If Bitcoin Core devs didn't disclose the Bcash vulnerability, it could've wiped a billion dollars off their balance sheets.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DkWzMSoUwAEn0W8.jpg

jackg

copper member

Activity: 2856

Merit: 3071

https://bit.ly/387FXHi lightning theory

Well, bye bitmain. I was going to try to buy from you, now I'll switch to other companies...

Quote from: BitMaxz on August 23, 2018, 02:58:12 PM

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Quote

"Data protection by design and by default", means that business process that handle personal data must be designed and built with consideration of the principles and provide safeguards to protect data (for example, using pseudonymization or full anonymization where approriate), and use the highest-possible privacy settings by default, so that the data is not available publicly without explicit, informed consent, and cannot be used to identify a subject without additional information stored separately. No personal data may be processed unless it is done under a lawful basis specified by the regulation or unless the data controller or processor has received an unambiguous and individualized affirmation of consent from the data subject. The data subject has the right to revoke this consent at any time.

So show us your ID so we can protect your data and keep you able to use anonymous/psuedoanonymous services Grin

.
Huh?

leowonderful

legendary

Activity: 1624

Merit: 1130

Bitcoin FTW!

I can only infer it's IPO related, really the only thing that comes to my mind. I don't want to send them my passport either (though it's a Chinese ID) as of yet, and I hate seeing KYC popping up everywhere in crypto.

Here's the email that was sent to me in code, for better formatting and reading:

Code:

Dear customer,

Thank you for choosing Bitmain!

Our official website https://www.bitmain.com/ will launch the Real-name Authentication on 24/08/2018 00:00 (UTC/GMT +8). Kindly complete the authentication as soon as possible, otherwise purchasing may be restricted/blocked.

1. Due to regulatory compliance requirements, some personal information including name, ID type, ID number, address information will be collected for the purposes of identity authentication. Kindly log in to our official website: https://www.bitmain.com/ -User Center for real-name authentication. The information collected is confidential and will not be disclosed by us to unauthorized third parties without your consent, except when required for the purposes of meeting government, legal or other regulatory requirements.

2. Customers are kindly reminded to provide accurate and truthful information for authentication and not to provide data which is false, or which belongs to third parties. Authentication information may not be modified after the authentication is confirmed.

3. The authentication process will be carried out immediately upon receipt of said personal information, and we will notify you of the authentication result by mail. Our purchase limit structure for the authentication is as follows:

Visit Tweet linked above for the chart. Difficult to format here.

During the transition period（Aug 24th— Sep 24th）, customers who registered our official website before Aug 24th can purchase up to 1 million RMB from our domestic website and up to 150,000 US dollars from our English website；After Sep 24th, the purchase authority will be consistent with the above table based on the authentication results.

4. Revocation of our authorization to collect your personal information is accepted. To do so, please email us at [email protected] . Upon receipt of such revocation requests, we will no longer collect your information, and any personal information held by us will be deleted from our system in accordance with applicable laws and regulations. Please do note that should the revocation be done, you will not be able to purchase any more through https://www.bitmain.com/. Should you wish to purchase from us again in the future, you will need to go through the authentication process again.

Thank you for your kind attention and please do not hesitate to contact us in case of any clarifications required.

Best regards

Bitmain

BitMaxz

legendary

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Playbet.io - Crypto Casino and Sportsbook

This might be the reason why they are now asking for KYC documents and look at this twitter post https://twitter.com/WhalePanda/status/1032642678444515329 just posted 5hrs ago.

Baofeng

legendary

Activity: 2576

Merit: 1655

Quote from: not.you on August 23, 2018, 01:54:23 PM

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

I don't know, I can only speculate that someone is putting "pressure" on them to require KYC before you can buy mining gear from them or just related to their IPO perhaps?

not.you

legendary

Activity: 1726

Merit: 1018

Anyone know the reasoning behind this? Buying and selling hardware is hardly the same as what an exchange does. I'm leery about giving them a copy of my passport.

Topic: Bitmain now requiring KYC documentation to buy hardware (Read 774 times)