Can virtual wallets be confiscated by courts?

darkangel11

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Quote from: Brunus on October 13, 2019, 04:38:52 PM

Well, if you're stupid enough to let your court know your address, you deserve to have it confiscated ...
Otherwise, it's so easy - at least for now - to keep it a secret that there's no reason to worry.

And here's when we're touching theory vs practice. Theoretically court can order you to do almost anything. They can take property, put you into debt, search your house, take all your personal belongings even the ones that don't belong to you but someone else like friends and family, they can take your freedom they can make you work for them they can even take your voting rights. This is their ability but to execute is another thing. We all know they can't take your money if they can't find it. They can't put you in jail if they can't catch you, so if you don't give them your private key they won't get it.

Brunus

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Well, if you're stupid enough to let your court know your address, you deserve to have it confiscated ...
Otherwise, it's so easy - at least for now - to keep it a secret that there's no reason to worry.

bitbunnny

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These wallets have to be placed somwhere, they need to have some provider who has the obligation to provide requested data to law enforcement and other authorities.
So, the answer is yes, for the needs of criminal procedure or other legal mather wallets and funds they contain could be confiscated.
But of course that also depends on the legal system from country to country and how are cryptocurrencies and crypto services defined and regulated.

senin

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Such a possibility is quite probable, however, a number of conditions are necessary for this.
Firstly, cryptocurrency in the state must be legalized and have a certain legal status. Without this, it is very difficult for courts to make decisions regarding cryptocurrencies.
Secondly, the court must have at its disposal information about a secret key or another way of accessing the wallet where the cryptocurrency is located. Without this, any court decision on the confiscation of cryptocurrency will not be implemented, and therefore it makes no sense to make it.

TheClownSong

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If virtual money or cryptocurrency regulated by government, for courts its more easily because its trackable. The best thing about cryptocurrency is the ledger is transparant and anybody can see the transaction and its hard to duplicate the transaction data. Government can confiscated virtual money because they have regulation about it if the money used for illegal transaction or criminal activity

basyang

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Quote from: SnowAugustine on November 26, 2018, 03:43:49 PM

I am just curious and have been googling on whether the law has rules about virtual wallets. Maybe I am just not really familiar with the technical terms so I do not understand well. Or I just didn't use the correct search terms.
To give an example, if you have debts or have to pay for alimony or something of the like, are virtual wallets included in your assets to be seized or something?
According to the summary of this article: https://www.acamstoday.org/real-considerations-for-law-enforcement-in-seizing-virtual-currency/
"The bottom line for law enforcement is that they cannot seize virtual currency if they do not recognize it and do not know where to look. Even if evidence of virtual currency is found, unless law enforcement is equipped with the knowledge and the tools to take secure possession of it, then it will not happen and criminals will keep their ill-gotten gains."
So does that mean that the law will not touch your virtual wallet in case of debt, for example?

Well, for me it depends on the government of a country if they banned or legal or have a regulation about using cryptocurrency, the court can not confiscate your cryptocurrency if they have no basis or any rules that can break because of using virtual currency. So if you know how to use cryptocurrency avoid using it in illegal activities because they might do an action to stop using it.

2chase

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I like cryptocurrency, including because the things about which the author of this topic says - really have a place to be. This means that no one can force you to tell your private keys to someone if you don’t want it, it’s just physically impossible to do, none of the law enforcement officers will torture you in order to get this information from you.

BTCGOLD

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There is many wallets that have been conficated. I think there are only two possibilities for the wallet to be confiscated. It may be the takeover of data storages (hard disks, CD/DVD, memory stick..) on which there are private keys saved, or the overtaking of exchange wallet.

jcpone

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Maybe for now it is not possinle to confiscate any virtual wallet by any court or institution. This is the main reason why a lot criminals and syndicates are using bitcoin to hide their illegal activities. However, as soon as the world accept and recognize cryptocurrency, for sure regulations will be done.

rickyNmorty

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Quote from: Netnox on November 27, 2018, 12:28:24 PM

This is what happened with Ross Ulbricht, right? The FBI seized more than 200K coins from his wallet and later they auctioned all those coins. So my guess is that it is possible for the courts to confiscate the coins.

Possible it is but then it should go with the right jurisdiction. In which everything must be on the law and the law will be fair. And also we are talking about a property in which they are about to get to.you, therefore it is indeed important to have rules regarding to this. But as of today I am not sure if there is a country who have such law.

anjho.ace

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How will they know who owns the wallet?
How will the court confiscate the wallet to whom?
Virtual wallet is protected by private keys and everyone can create wallet anonymously.

mummybtc

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Yes, it can, there are mny BTC wallet that was confiscated from SIlk road owner, provider you give them access to the private keys, this is why of possible one need to memorise the private keys but the down side to this is if something happen and ones family will not be able to gain access to this wealth

sinkfish

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if unknown then it wont.

darklus123

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Digital wallets were highly moderated by the government(except for crypto traders). So any form of fraud can be a subject of investigation and yes they can confiscate the amount. I've seen a lot of HYIP that shutdowns because they have violated paypal rules and paypals were ordered to surrender the amount to the government during the investigation

When it comes to crypto , it depends because it happens already that the us government mandated coinbase to give the personal data for a possible tax evasion cases but they refuse to

MainIbem

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You noticed that many exchanges are conforming to KYC. The KYC is linked to your virtual wallet. So if you have a court judgment confiscating your assets and you think it will not affect your 'virtual' then you have to think again. Cryptocurrencies are not here to conceal peoples assets.

cc80aa

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there are many different kind of digital wallet some of the wallet have your kyc profile if the government investigate about your wallet. yes they can trace if the company have giving a details to the government side.

iMark

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Quote from: realcrypto on December 03, 2018, 08:22:23 AM

If monetary law enforcement agency know about your digital asset it means the owner of wallet or the exchange that you are using is working hand in hand with Government. I think this is possible because of the rate at which most exchange are asking for KYC.

Yeah it could happen, the government could have seized all your assets if you saved on one of the third party exchanges that had
control of your assets. but this will not apply if you save it in a decentralized wallet

Pumapipa

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In my opnion, virtual wallets like this that we are using are to be considered admissible to any court and can be confiscated shall it be warranted by the presiding judge. Virtual wallets may or may not contain assets that can be liquidated and can be presented in any court. This can be an example of evidences that can be used against a person for example in grounds of money laundering.

Rena5

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It depends from where nation we belong,certain laws are applied according to the crimes or disobedience done.Upon all the different views here in the forum it depends always on rules and regulations of the government we belong.
Virtual wallets can be confiscated by courts, its possible once they know some illegal activities or dealings online.There are experts on this kind of problems
nowadays with the latest technology online.Protect virtual wallets as much as we can.
Just to be fair and free from any problem regarding your virtual wallets or bitcoins on hand.Have a clean living always.

iv4n

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Governments can confiscate what ever they lay their hands on. If there isn't a law about it be sure that they will make one ASAP. When it's come to bitcoin and governments there is a way to cheat them, simply buy a hardware wallet, before sending bitcoins use mixer, disconnect the wallet and you are safe, of course don't spread words about it and you will be just fine.
I think everyone should have that kind of backup with some coins there, you never know when will government knock on your door with papers about paying tax and giving them your coins.

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