Topic: DEA agent discusses Bitcoin in class today (Read 8573 times)

This guy says it is possible.

With a little work, apparently.

It is if the seller agrees to it in exchange for a lighter sentence.

Is this legal for DEA?

lol

Yeah but did everyone know a kid who could easily get them other drugs?  Does everyone know how to get hold of research chemicals (which you typically have to get from overseas anyway)?

I think it's inevitable that at some point law enforcement somewhere will use SR as a honey-pot.  That doesn't mean that SR started out that way, though.  The one issue I see for users is that in many places buying locally wouldn't put them at significant legal risk - if they got caught they'd be looking at a minor possession charge or a caution.  Once they're buying from overseas, though, the risk of importation charges arises and those tend to be more severe.

Exactly!

Yeah now that stoner kid buys his dope off SR and sells locally

It's real alright. Why? Cause of convenience, safety, quality, you know all the other attributes of a services that makes it more attractive than it's competition..

Feds have broken up highly sophisticated Eastern Euro hacking groups that stole credit cards and operated in total anonymity by just infiltrating the organization, gaining trust and waiting for them to drop their comsec eventually, or bleeding them for intel. Obviously they are doing the same to SR. I remember SR 'hiring' for database admins in the news once you can be assured all the applications for the job were feds.

If they are eventually busted it definitely won't be due to bitcoin txn tracking, it'll just be informants and entrapment like they've always done. Sabu is probably their database admin working from FBI hq.

Stands to reason that whoever runs it probably runs their own bitcoin hosting company as well, since you wouldn't trust that kind of a server in anybody else's hands and the front company would help you launder the funds. You would also be the guy they go to and ask to retrieve the box should anything happen, allowing you to cut the power to it or push your deadman switch to nuke evidence before handing it over. Lot's of methods that don't involve any transaction tracing the feds can utilize though I would imagine one day SR will shut down, I wouldn't want to run something like that forever when you had enough money to retire to a beach mansion and be able to sleep without worrying about door being kicked down

I am surprised no one has talked about Mises and his work in Human Action about government's inability to perform Economic Calculation. That is the root problem of their inability to allocate resources without tremendous waste and there is nothing they can do about it. And this is even more pronounced with technology which because of complexity that requires greater division and specialization of labor.

Plus, it all comes down to the cost of protection and return on investment from extortion. Sure, if the NSA is really after you then they are going to find you and could even run a Tempest attack via Van Eck phreaking if they wanted to. But even in bureaucracies there are limited resources which have to be allocated. DEA agents are going to go after the targets where returns from civil forfeiture are highest because that is how their budgets are funded.

Sure, tracking bitcoin transactions is possible but is it probable? Probably not because tracking that takes 2 minutes with Paypal or a credit card takes hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of dollars with bitcoin. The cost of protection massively plummets while the return on investment from tracking or attempting to seize, etc. skyrocket at exponential rates. Thus, Bitcoin functions like all other forms of cryptography with intractability and therefore creating strong surveillance protection.

I think you hit the nail on the head regarding "waste of time, etc...". The reason silk road isn't going anywhere anytime soon is the size and scope. It is naturally restricted to a small internet community (relatively speaking) due to technology requirements.

Getting there with the Tor network is pretty straight forward but then going through the trouble of learning how bitcoin works, how to get funds from your hands to an exchange, how to then get the bitcoin to your wallet, then to SR will make your average user's head spin. Then throw in the fact that most seller's require PGP for messages within SR and the user now has to learn to use PGP ...suddenly the average user's head explodes. Easier for them to find some shady friend of a friend to get stuff from on the street.

This limited flow on SR would be like the cops wanting to spend hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of dollars in man hours and technology to bust a a few kids selling playboy magazines to a bunch of 15 year olds when real life politics and public relations force them to do the morally superior thing, i.e., spending those same resources hunting down and prosecuting peddlers of child porn.

That's exactly why they would do it, they need to justify their budget if they want to keep it.  Going after "a webring of drug dealing kingpins" goes over well in the press and in their budget review. 

But in what sense is that a threat to bitcoin?  If that person is properly accounting for income or gains from bitcoin, they're not breaking any law and they are paying their taxes.  If they aren't, well, then that person has an issue with the IRS, but it's not really a bitcoin or an exchange problem.  It might cause the IRS to pass some new regulations regarding individual and business reporting or record keeping when it comes to bitcoin.  This might even prompt people to write new software that helps them track things like capital gains on bitcoin investment, etc.  Now, of course, people can operate entirely underground (both individuals and merchants), but that happens all the time today, irrespective of bitcoin.

I think money laundering is the more immediate issue.  It's an issue that the exchanges need to be very careful about and make sure they're following all the KYC and AML laws.  Personally, I think law enforcement needs to give up trying to stop money laundering.  There are just too many ways criminals can launder money these days (again, irrespective of bitcoin).  They should focus on other techniques than tracking or stopping financial transactions (and tracking everyone's financial transactions is too great of a threat to people's liberty for it to be an acceptable law enforcement tool).  It may take a while, but I think in time, law enforcement and the public at large will arrive at similar conclusions.

If you are a SR buyer, encrypt your wallet and never sign for a delivery, you are fine. You can only be busted by a PI if they get you in a controlled delivery which requires a signature. And the idea that the USPS would spend resources on a controlled delivery for personal use amounts of weed or pills is laughable. If you are buying a kilo of cocaine or heroine however, expect a controlled delivery and if you don't sign, expect a warranted search of your house/apt.

I believe any threat to bitcoin isn't going to come from the FBI,  Homeland Security or the DEA...  the honest to goodness threat to bitcoin is going to come the IRS.

At some point in the future someone is going to have a bunch of bitcoins sold at Mt.Gox or whatever,  then when he tries to transfer the money to his bank account that's when the IRS is going to start asking questions..  freezing accounts.. etc etc...   

That's when it becomes a problem,  not when when the transfers are in bitcoin,  but when someone tries to convert it to another currency...   as long as the guy hangs out in bitcoin only most likely he is fairly safe... but the second it gets converted the IRS is going to start asking questions...

That's just my two satoshi's.

This.

Interesting...haha

The DEA prides itself on big hauls and tends to leave small stuff to the locals. Success in their line of work is measured in kilos and tons.

I can see them making a bit of noise about SR crackdowns to discourage use of the site, but it's hard to imagine them dedicating a ton of technological resources to a relatively tiny number of people selling each other dime bags over the Internet.

I could be wrong, but it seems like it would be a waste of a lot of time, energy, and money for very little return. Granted, that statement could apply to all drug law enforcement.

You want to make a bet on that? It's obviously being tracked, your dumb to think otherwise.