Topic: Coinbase the most anti-Bitcoin organisation. Make #DeleteCoinbase great again - page 2. (Read 2242 times)

I even laugh harder when I read their privacy policy. What a bunch of shameless twats they are. Anybody having a Coinbase app on their phones shouldn't think beyond deleting it

Just in case you forgot how evil this institution is:

Coinbase Is Reportedly Selling Geolocation Data to ICE

   Personal Identification Information: Full name, date of birth, nationality, gender, signature, utility bills, photographs, phone number, home address, and/or email.

    Formal Identification Information: Government issued identity document such as Passport, Driver's License, National Identity Card, State ID Card, Tax ID number, passport number, driver's license details, national identity card details, visa information, and/or any other information deemed necessary to comply with our legal obligations under financial or anti-money laundering laws.

    Institutional Information: Employer Identification number (or comparable number issued by a government), proof of legal formation (e.g. Articles of Incorporation), personal identification information for all material beneficial owners.

    Financial Information: Bank account information, payment card primary account number (PAN), transaction history, trading data, and/or tax identification.

    Transaction Information: Information about the transactions you make on our Services, such as the name of the recipient, your name, the amount, and/or timestamp.

    Employment Information: Office location, job title, and/or description of role.

    Correspondence: Survey responses, information provided to our support team or user research team.

    Audio, electronic, visual and similar information, such as call and video recordings.

    ...

    Online Identifiers: Geo location/tracking details, browser fingerprint, operating system, browser name and version, and/or personal IP addresses.

    Usage Data: Authentication data, security questions, click-stream data, public social networking posts, and other data collected via cookies and similar technologies. Please read our Cookie Policy for more information.

Crypto exchange Coinbase's (COIN) analytics program, Coinbase Tracer, will provide the U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) with data about crypto users, including “historical geo tracking data” and transaction history, according to a contract obtained by watchdog group Tech Inquiry.

~snip~

For example, all crypto transactions will be deemed “travel rule eligible”. This means crypto is treated differently to fiat (which has a 1,000 EUR threshold), which establishes a clear advantage for traditional financial service providers over new technology, with significant anti-competition and anti-innovation implications.

Among the worst of the proposed provisions are new obligations on exchanges to collect, verify and report information on non-customers using self-hosted wallets.

Coinbase’s Chief Legal Officer added:

If you care about protecting the privacy of individuals, and focusing the law on solutions that actually address legitimate concerns about the illicit use of digital assets, now is the time to speak up and be heard. We must speak with one, strong voice against this proposal before it’s too late.

Making your voice heard ahead of Thursday’s critical EU vote

By Paul Grewal, Chief Legal Officer


Bad facts make bad law. We see this in jurisdictions all over the world, especially when it comes to digital assets. Unfortunately, we are about to see this again — this time in the European Union — in the form of a revision to the Transfer of Funds Regulation. If adopted, this revision would unleash an entire surveillance regime on exchanges like Coinbase, stifle innovation, and undermine the self-hosted wallets that individuals use to securely protect their digital assets. The vote will likely take place this week so time is running out.

Here are the bad “facts”:

(1) digital assets like Bitcoin, Ethereum and others are a primary way criminals hide and move money

(2) law enforcement has no way to track these movements

(3) requiring collection and verification of personal information associated with self-hosted is not a violation of their privacy

State of play

The truth is that digital assets are in general a markedly inferior way for criminals to hide their illicit financial activity. That’s why, according to the best research available, by far the most popular way to hide illicit financial activity remains cash. Unlike with cash, law enforcement can track and trace digital asset transfers with advanced analytics tools. None of this requires upsetting the settled privacy expectations of wallet holders because the open architecture underlying digital assets is public and offers unprecedented transparency into transaction details. The records are also permanent — no one (not crypto companies, not governments, not even bad actors) can destroy or alter information. In short, digital assets and the immutable nature of their blockchain technology actually enhances the ability to detect and deter illicit activity. But rather than embracing and leveraging the benefits that arise from the increasing use of digital assets, the EU’s proposal would cast them aside and impose a host of new privacy invasions on wallet users.

For example, all crypto transactions will be deemed “travel rule eligible”. This means crypto is treated differently to fiat (which has a 1,000 EUR threshold), which establishes a clear advantage for traditional financial service providers over new technology, with significant anti-competition and anti-innovation implications.

Among the worst of the proposed provisions are new obligations on exchanges to collect, verify and report information on non-customers using self-hosted wallets. For instance, one provision requires exchanges to not only collect personal data about wallet users who are not their customers, but to also verify the data’s accuracy before allowing a transfer to one of their customers. In fiat terms, this would basically mean you cannot take money out of your bank account to send to someone else until you share personal data with your financial institution about that person and verify their identity. Not only is this verification requirement nearly impossible to do but requiring exchanges to engage in extensive data collection, verification, and retention about non-customers runs against core EU data protection principles of data minimization and proportionality.

Another dangerous provision would require exchanges to inform “competent authorities” of every single transfer from a non-customer’s self-hosted wallet equal to or greater than 1,000 EUR — regardless of any suspicion of bad activity. The proposal even leaves the door open to a total ban on transfers to self-hosted wallets even though there is no evidence that such a ban would have any impact on illicit activity at all. Like we said, bad facts make bad policy.

Make your voice heard

There’s precious time to act and we need to make our voices heard. A vote on Parliament’s draft proposal could come as early as Thursday, March 31st. If you care about protecting the privacy of individuals, and focusing the law on solutions that actually address legitimate concerns about the illicit use of digital assets, now is the time to speak up and be heard. We must speak with one, strong voice against this proposal before it’s too late.

I was just thinking along the same lines of the post by RickDeckard above, but in relation to this point as well. We already know that Coinbase is anti-bitcoin, anti-privacy, pro-regulation, and pro-government by their ongoing work with the CIA, FBI, IRS, ICE, and a variety of other government agencies. It's no surprise really, when they are so happy to jump in to bed with the government, that they would be happy to jump in to bed with fiat banks and other institutions. Anything in the name of profit when it comes to Coinbase, to the detriment of all their users and even to bitcoin itself. As long as they keep lining their own pockets, right?

The Vidovics' account had risen to $168,596 on April 28 when the hacking occurred, according to account statements the Vidovics shared with CNBC. That amount was essentially wiped out, with only a $587.15 balance shown the next day.

Since 2016, Coinbase users have filed more than 11,000 complaints against Coinbase with the Federal Trade Commission and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, mostly related to customer service.

Some spies of mine referred me  that Coinbase is selling their services to institutional customers exactly this way: ultra compliance safe, regulation abiding, even at cost of being slightly behind the curve regarding to products offering.

I've said it before, but where is the outrage? Where is the lobbying? Where is the fight? As usual, absolutely nothing from Coinbase other than complete and immediate submission and selling out their users in order to continue to line their own pockets.

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Hit the nail on the head. Coinbase are going the same way of other large companies like Meta and Google - they are steadily transitioning to a data harvesting company. All the services and products they provide are really just a means to collecting and monetizing more data.

Every exchange must abide to regulation. This is a certainty, the point is Coinbase always is the first to fully implement regulations, in the detrimental interest of his users.

Unless, as speculated, that real users of Coinbase are the Governments and tax agencies around the world.

Coinbase confirms itself a pro-government organisation, even if they ask them aggressive actions against their customers:
Today this picture was all over Twitter:

If you leave your coins on an exchange, you leave yourself exposed to those aggressive practices.

Canadian government is now on a dystopian berserker after the “trucker incident”.
 Actually, honey badger doesn’t care.

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This is totally mindblowing, it looks more and more like the traditional banking system... I wonder will other exchanges also have to comply with these laws? I'm guessing that Binance somehow will "evade" this rule as it has been evading others for a while now...

For users in Singapore, all crypto transfers from a Coinbase user’s exchange wallet to an outside address will require the recipient's full name and country of residence. This will take effect on April 1, with Coinbase citing local Singaporean regulations.

And in Japan, all transfers of crypto assets to recipients outside of Japan must include the recipient’s name, address and destination wallet, according to the English translation of rules established by the Japan Cryptocurrency Trading Association (JVCEA). This will take effect on April 1.

At the time, the company stressed that "the information offered in Coinbase Analytics has always been kept completely separate from Coinbase internal data."

Coinbase "is the only vendor who can provide the licenses required by the agency," it said.

Everything you say is correct, but that news article is over a year old.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has signed a deal with Coinbase to use its blockchain tracing software, Coinbase Analytics.

The current deal value is $455,000 for one year, but it can go up to a total amount of $1.4 million through 2024, according to government tracker USAspending.gov.

Chainalysis - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22CHAINALYSIS+INC.%22
Elliptic - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22ELLIPTIC+INC.%22
Ciphertrace - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22CIPHERTRACE%2C+INC.%22
Coinbase Analytics - https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/fpdsportal?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.1&s=FPDS.GOV&q=VENDOR_FULL_NAME%3A%22COINBASE%2C+INC.%22

Quick Take

• Public records show that Coinbase wants to sell blockchain analytics software to the U.S. government
• Records indicate that the awards have not been made as of yet
• Both the DEA and IRS have expressed interest in awarding contracts to Coinbase for an analytics platform called Coinbase Analytics
• The developments come a year after Coinbase’s controversial purchase of intelligence firm Neutrino, and Neutrino is mentioned in the IRS documentation