Topic: Is Bitcoin really censorship-resistent if they can't reach Canadian truckers (Read 392 times)

If we extrapolate this to the extreme: governments can also simply state 'now all (opposed to coming from addresses a,b,c,d,e) BTC is illegal', banning anyone from trading BTC for products (buying stuff) or fiat (exchanging currency). It would be a purely legal thing, so no technological changes or advancements can prevent that.

(4) Process for selecting special measures.—In selecting which special measure or measures to take under this subsection, the Secretary of the Treasury—
(A) shall consult with the Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, any other appropriate Federal banking agency (as defined in section 3 of the Federal Deposit Insurance Act) [1] the Secretary of State, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the National Credit Union Administration Board, and in the sole discretion of the Secretary, such other agencies and interested parties as the Secretary may find to be appropriate; and
(B) shall consider—
(i) whether similar action has been or is being taken by other nations or multilateral groups;
(ii) whether the imposition of any particular special measure would create a significant competitive disadvantage, including any undue cost or burden associated with compliance, for financial institutions organized or licensed in the United States;
(iii) the extent to which the action or the timing of the action would have a significant adverse systemic impact on the international payment, clearance, and settlement system, or on legitimate business activities involving the particular jurisdiction, institution, class of transactions, or type of account; and
(iv) the effect of the action on United States national security and foreign policy.

We have mixers and CoinJoins, sure. But we also have exchanges that freeze coins that originate from known mixers, casinos, and whatnot. I expect this is going to become a trend in the future. Regulatory pressure will force centralized exchanges to consider funds that came from such services as being dirty, illegal, and laundered. You will be asked to prove that you are not a criminal and not the other way around. For that reason we have decentralized exchanges...until they find a way to blacklist those coins as well. When and if they do that, we are left with face-to-face deals.   

You are just trying to justify the dictatorship. The "fact" if you have ever bothered to do some research, is that it had nothing to do with radicalism or even any anti-government move. The cases are simple as liking a photo of truckers protesting mandatory jabs some of them on private profiles.

No government can stop a Bitcoin transaction. They can only tell exchanges to not accept deposits from certain addresses, so the solution is to use mixing and use decentralized exchanges and p2p trading. It's bad that on practice you will want to exchange Bitcoin back to fiat, because it's hard to spend it directly, but Bitcoin is the only chance to avoid government control, everything else operates on KYC principle so accounts and funds can be instantly frozen.

They even contacted one of the wallet providers to share the data they have on the donators and stop funds and they wrote back that they only provide software allowing users to access money on the blockchain, they don't freeze anything and don't have access to any funds One would think they'd put someone tech savvy in charge of the investigation. Someone who knows that a wallet provider cannot access private keys.

The article on Coindesk, provided by stompix, says the money was raised in cryptos, but that the the Deputy Prime Minister said banks CAN freeze bank accounts tied to truckers. First, bank accounts and crypto wallets are two different things, so I suppose nobody's seizing the wallets themselves. Second, there's no rule that banks MUST freeze bank accounts, they are simply allowed to do that if they see it fit. And theor police ordered regulated firms to cease facilitating transactions from those wallets. So, based on all this, it seems that the wallets are still in the hands of the protestors (if the wallets are non-custodial), and the problem is with making big names accept payment from these wallets or with converting this money into fiat through regulated exchanges. It limits the options, but I don't think it shows the wallets being censored.

i personally am a bitcoin maximalist. but im not a wishful dreamer.
bitcoin is great. no one can touch your coins without the keys..  ..but be prepared and aware of the points of failure about how the keys can be found.
they cant brute force the blockchain for your coin. but they can bruteforce your front door, PC, devices, and interrogate you under punishment of prison for staying quiet

But for that we have mixers.  

1. THIS COURT ORDERS that this motion is properly returnable today as the motion is
brought without notice.

Mareva Injunction
2. THIS COURT ORDERS that the Mareva Respondents and their servants, employees, agents, assigns, officers, directors and anyone else acting on their behalf or in conjunction with any of them, and any and all persons with notice of this Order, are restrained from directly or
indirectly, by any means whatsoever:
   (a) selling, removing, dissipating, alienating, transferring, assigning, encumbering,
        or similarly dealing with the assets of the Mareva Respondents listed in Schedule “A”
   (b) instructing, requesting, counselling, demanding, or encouraging any other person
         to conduct themselves contrary to paragraph 2(a) above;
  and
   (c) facilitating, assisting in, aiding, abetting, or participating in any acts the effect of
        which is to contrary to paragraph 2(a) above, until final disposition of this action or further Order of this Court.

3. THIS COURT ORDERS that paragraph 2 applies to all of the assets listed in Schedule “A” to this Order, whether or not they are in the Mareva Respondents’ own names, whether or not they are solely or jointly owned, and whether or not the Mareva Respondents have exclusive control over the asset. For the purpose of this Order, a Mareva Respondent’s assets include any asset which he or she has the power, directly or indirectly, to dispose of or deal with as if it were his or her own. The Mareva Respondent is to be regarded as having such power if a third party holds or controls the assets in accordance with his or her direct or indirect instructions.

4. THIS COURT ORDERS that if the total value free of charges or other securities of the assets listed in Schedule “A” to this Order exceeds $20 million, the Mareva Respondents may sell, remove, dissipate, alienate, transfer, assign, encumber, or similarly deal with them so long
as the total unencumbered value of the Mareva Respondent’s frozen assets remains above $ 20million.

Undertaking as to Damages
5. THIS COURT ORDERS that the requirement in Rule 40.03 of the Rules of Civil Procedure for the moving party to provide an undertaking as to damages potentially arising from the granting and enforcing of this Order is hereby dispensed with.

Ordinary Living Expenses
6. THIS COURT ORDERS that any Mareva Respondent may apply for an order, on at least twenty-four (24) hours notice to the Plaintiffs, specifying the amount of funds which the Mareva Respondent requires from the assets listed in Schedule “A” to this Order to spend on
ordinary living expenses and legal advice and representation. The Mareva Respondent may also be provided with access to the assets it requires to spend on ordinary living expenses and legal
advance and representation with the written consent of the Plaintiffs.

Disclosure of Information
7. THIS COURT ORDERS that each Mareva Respondent shall prepare and provide to the Plaintiffs, within 7 days of the date of service of this Order, a sworn statement describing the nature, value, and location of his or her assets worldwide, whether in his own name or not and
whether solely or jointly owned, which are being used, have been earmarked for, or are intended to be used to fund, directly or indirectly, activities associated with the Freedom Convoy protests in or around the City of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada which began on or about January 29, 2022 worldwide, including but not limited to any digital assets (and any associated cryptocurrency wallet addresses).

8. THIS COURT ORDERS that each Mareva Respondent shall submit to an examination under oath within 7 days of the delivery by the Mareva Respondent of the aforementioned sworn statement referred to in paragraph 7.

9. THIS COURT ORDERS that if the provision of any of the information set out in paragraph 7 is likely to incriminate the Mareva Respondent, he or she may be entitled to refuse to provide it, but is recommended to take legal advice before refusing to provide the information. Wrongful refusal to provide the information referred to in paragraph 7 is contempt of court and may render the Mareva Respondent liable to be imprisoned, fined, or have his or her assets seized.

Intermediaries
10. THIS COURT ORDERS that the entities listed in Schedule “B” as well as any banks, financial institutions, money service businesses, fundraising platforms or websites, cryptocurrency exchanges or platforms, or custodians of any cryptocurrency wallets, (collectively, the “ Intermediaries”) shall, upon being provided with notice of this Order, forthwith freeze and otherwise prevent any removal, dissipation, alienation, transfer, assignment, encumbrance, transaction, or similar dealing with any of the assets identified in Schedule “A” to this Order.

11. THIS COURT ORDERS that the Intermediaries shall forthwith disclose and deliver up to the Plaintiffs any and all records held by the Intermediary concerning the Mareva Respondents’ assets, including the existence, nature, value and location of any monies or assets
or credit, wherever situate, held on behalf of the Mareva Respondent by the Intermediaries.

Alternative Payment of Security into Court
12. THIS COURT ORDERS that this Order will cease to have effect if the Mareva Respondents provide security by collectively paying the sum of $20 million into Court, and the Accountant of the Superior Court of Justice is hereby directed to accept such payment.

Variation, Discharge or Extension of Order
13. THIS COURT ORDERS that anyone served with or notified of this Order may apply to the Court at any time to vary or discharge this Order, on four (4) days’ notice to the Plaintiffs.

14. THIS COURT ORDERS that the Plaintiffs shall apply for an extension of this Order on or before February 28, 2022, failing which this Order will terminate.

The canadian truckers are unable to get a hold of the 21 bitcoin that have been donated to them recently because the wallets associated with the fundraising have been tracked and banned from all regulated financial institutions (including banks and exchanges). Two questions for discussion:
1. Is bitcoin really censorship resistent if the government can track and ban addresses? Bitfinex hackers being tracked and caught is another example (though most people would argue that this is an example of "positive" censorship resistence, unlike the canadian truckers example).
2. Can bitcoin be both censorship resistent and transparent at the same time?

What if the Bitcoin I receive from Grin > Bitcoin are tainted as you say?  The 'tainting' strategy works similar to a Ponzi scheme: it works until it does not.  You can not taint addresses because it ultimately leads to all addresses having a tainted history.  The Bitcoin you hold may have been part of a drug deal before.  We probably all own a coin with tainted history.  If you want a Cryptocurrency that is truly fungible, it is Monero.  But you have to pay in Monero directly, if you do not want to spend possibly dirty coins.

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Regards,
PrivacyG

Getting the authorising fund holder to not make a transaction is still stopping the transaction, is it not exactly what this is called?  If I am getting you not to exit the house, I am stopping you from exiting it.  It is their power to stop transactions.  No, I was definitely not talking about a 'red button' either.  The idea still is that they can not stop a Bitcoin transaction from happening while banks can always close your account, freeze your funds et cetera..

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Regards,
PrivacyG

but government doesnt "stop" a transaction..

government sends a court order request to a bank service telling the bank service not to make a transaction or get penalised if they do.

there is no "red button" thats connected directly to a SWIFT(international wire), RTGS(fedwire('wire transfer')), .. its always a case where 'government' get the authorising fund holder to not make a transaction. just with regulation. it only takes the equivalent of a formal email rather than a swat team

I suppose hatshepsut93 was referring about the government stopping a Bitcoin transaction the same way they can stop a bank transaction.  

government cant stop a bitcoin transaction thats already sent. but if they know the identity of the current fund key holders. then governments can stop the key holders from making a transaction.. its called handcuffs.

No government can stop a Bitcoin transaction.