Topic: Mozilla says they'll accept Bitcoin & crypto donations (Read 697 times)

No wonder they stopped receiving cryptocurrency donation.


The statistic itself (Energy Consumption Per Transaction (kWh) on PDF page is biased anyway. Energy for PoW mining doesn't affect how much transaction could be processed.

And now they accept neither Bitcoin or Dogecoin.


IMO it's unlikely since Mozilla have very small influence on cryptocurrency/blockchain space.

I wonder whether they'll accept cryptocurrency again after people move their attention from cryptocurrency/blockchain to different topic.


I don't see how those article is defending Kape since they clearly stated their business clearly invade user privacy and manipulate website about VPN review. IMO any privacy-conscious won't use Kape service after reading that article, especially when they know there's better company/service.

Apparently we had a recent update from Mozilla[1] - 7th of April - regarding their stance on accepting BTC and other crypto as donations. Combining the announcement[1] and the wiki entry[2] we get this:

If anyone is interested to see the presentation used at the Mozilla cryptocurrency donation policy and review you can check it out here[3]. Some key figures that I highlight:

• On average they receive $1.000 in cryptocurrency donations (they don't specify by type);
• In all of 2021, Mozilla received 41 transactions, split between BTC (28), BCH (12) and LTC (1). They represented a total of $1,524;
• Out of a total of $3,473,949 received in donations in 2021, the crypto donations represented only 0,04 % of the total balance. In slide 13 they state that 0,04 % belongs to BTC but that's not quite right due to the fact that there were some other coins being donated (BCH and LTC for instance).

After some slides they go into a speculation field where they somehow leverage their average donations and attach a certain kg of CO2 but I don't think that such measure could be made, specially considering that they didn't posted the assumptions that they've used to obtain these figures. They do note that this are "informed estimates" but not much is explained past this field.

I guess we'll have to wait by end of Q2 2022 to see which coins they deem that are a better match for their climate stance.

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[1]https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/blog/reporting-back-on-mozillas-cryptocurrency-donation-policy/
[2]https://wiki.mozilla.org/Foundation/Cryptocurrency_Donations
[3]https://wiki.mozilla.org/images/8/80/Mozilla_Foundation_Cryptocurrency_Donation_Review_%28MoFo_Meeting%29.pdf

Mozilla is one of my favorite software and I still go to use it sometimes even though now Chrome is what I use (because of work),,, just I wish they did not say about DOGE first before Bitcoin. But I guess these days if you do not pay heed to the trendy things going on,,, people ignore you and move on.

Nice to hear, and I guess this is the reason for the DOGE boost?

A common theme. People constantly say how risky DEXs are and how likely you are to be scammed using them, having never actually used them themselves. Or people say that bitcoin doesn't work as a currency and no one uses it a currency, having never actually tried to use it as a currency. And then people like me, who use DEXs constantly and spend bitcoin as a currency constantly are just sitting over here like , while every centralized exchange in existence continues to leak or sell user data and arbitrarily lock accounts and seize coins.

There has been one successful hack against Bisq, due to a flaw in the code which allowed an attacker to modify the address of the timelocked escrow transaction to their own wallet. They used it to steal 3 Bitcoin and 4000 Monero. A proposal was quickly made and accepted to use funds from the Bisq DAO to fully reimburse all affected users: https://github.com/bisq-network/proposals/issues/209

You probably never used Bisq in your life, maybe you read few lines how it works in theory and you are just making an assumptions, like if I would say that you could lost your money when you purchase vegetables in your local shop.
If trading on Bisq something goes wrong it would probably be my own fault for being stupid, and on centralized exchanges I don't have any control and I can lose everything without.
How many times you heard that someone got hacked or scammed using Bisq?
I never eve heard something like that, but I hear all the time about people getting scammed, or accounts get frozen or lose money on centralized exchanges.

They want you to create an account with your real name and full address. How is that not invading your privacy? It is unnecessary for a VPN to collect that information en masse from every customer, since a good VPN will accept anonymous crypto payments.

And if you look at the other information I quoted in the linked post:
I've literally never been scammed once.

Bisq specifically do not accept payment methods which are easily reversible:

I feel far safer trading on Bisq than I do risking all my coins and risking my identity being stolen by using a centralized exchange. The list of centralized exchange hacks (for either coins or data) is endless.

From what I can tell, those who were using the software distributed on their platform were not paying Crossrider (now Kape). It is unclear if they had paying customers (startups often offer their services for free as a ways to get a userbase), however it appears their customers were the developers who would host their software on their platform. I haven't seen any evidence they were offering any kind of warranty on software being distributed on their platform.


I am saying it is not possible to use the data to invade your privacy. You are saying it is unnecessary. Most, if not all of this data is also collected by theymos on this forum. Most of this information is sent to the website you are visiting by default.


Apart from the speed issue related to using Bisq, and the issue that centralized exchanges ultimately are necessary to provide a price reference for professional traders on Bisq, I think there is a very real risk that you will have your money stolen. The incentive structure on Bisq means that you will probably not have anyone scamming for $1, but for larger amounts, the risk is real. Bisq allows for many reversible payment methods that can be potentially reversed long after the fact. Bisq also mentions that sellers accepting higher risk payment methods may ask for things such as "proof" of identity, and giving your information to these types of people is especially risky, far more risky than giving your information to Binance or Coinbase, IMO

It is totally possible with Bisq exchange, and if done correctly it can be even more reliable, because you can't get your account terminated or coins frozen, like in centralized exchanges.
You are not sending any documents for verification so there is nothing to leak and you are much safer there.
I read report how criminals in Croatia used only centralized exchanges like Binance for scamming people, they use Anydesk to gain access to computers of people,
than they send fiat money to Binance exchange, and then buy crypto and withdraw it to their own wallet.
It's really happening now, it's not a theory.

As I said before, I find it irrelevant. Either way, they were allowing their paying customers to be infected with malware. This is significantly different to the analogy you give you people downloading malware via a torrent. This company was doing zero due diligence to the product they were offering consumers.

If the VPN doesn't offer crypto payments, then I wouldn't be using it.

So it's fine for your VPN to collect a bunch of data unnecessary data on you if they aren't going to use it to invade your privacy? I don't accept that reasoning for a second.

I've been doing this for years.

Yes, sadly, it appears Mozilla has stopped accepting crypto donations.

If you ask me, the article you cited (and the one I left in my quote of your post), is more of a defense of Kape, than an indictment.

For example, the article says:
I would say that Kape distributed malware the same way that theymos promotes the idea that CSW is satoshi -- by hosting a platform in which 3rd parties can post content, even if some people do not like the content.

I am not aware of any evidence that Kape actually created any malware, or that there was malware in any of their software -- the malware was in software distributed on their platform. After the original Napster was shutdown in 2001, there were a various number of torrent-like platforms that allowed people to download what amounted to pirated music (and movies?). Sometimes, people would share malware disguised as a popular song or video -- in these cases, the torrent platform was not distributing the malware. There are various messages in various transactions and in block headers in the bitcoin blockchain, these messages are not being distributed by "bitcoin", nor are they being distributed by the devs who create bitcoin core.
If you are paying via the legacy banking system, you really cannot not give your name and address to the merchant (or prevent it from being easily available to the merchant). If you are paying via crypto, it would be trivial to provide fake details.

If you are using an app on your phone, any potential input can potentially cause problems. Unless you expect someone to cross-reference satellite images of people spinning while looking at their phones to their gyro-sensor data, providing this data is not going to result in any loss of privacy.

It is not possible to reliably convert fiat to coin or coin to fiat via a DEX. You will ultimately need a centralized exchange with a payment provider, or accept an elevated risk of being scammed (by someone who is not the exchange).

Oh please don't get me started with that topic, and if Mozilla really cared about that they should not allow donations in fiat currencies coming from military industrial complex.
They made a mess with starting to support all kinds of shitcoins like doge, instead of just accepting Bitcoin and Lightning Network, if they care so much, and they don't but they just cracked under pressure because they are weak.

I think that healthy dose of skepticism about trusting any company or government system is good, especially if we blindly tell us to trust something without doing our own investigation.
Is it possible to live in today modern world with total privacy and security?
No, but that doesn't mean I should sign up and send my information everywhere without any thinking.
If there is a option for doing the same thing without any kyc, I would always go for that option, even if it means some inconvenience for me.

More people that use DEX exchanges it would be harder for centralized exchanges to ''piss'' on everyone and do whatever they like until regulators twist their arm.

You're sure about that? You are going to take the word of company which deliberately infected its own customers with malware? Pretty sure that wasn't in their terms of service.

And even if you believe that, some of the data they are collecting - name, address, battery level, gyro-sensor data - is in no way useful from a diagnostics point of view and would only ever serve to invade your privacy.

Until they decide that your payment has triggered one of their hidden algorithms and refuse to process it until you complete KYC.

It's the same as using a non-KYC centralized exchange. You are only non-KYCed as long as they allow you to be, and that could end at any time without warning and result in the seizure or loss of your funds if you don't comply. If you want to avoid KYC, you choose a DEX. If you want to avoid KYC, you don't choose BitPay.

The data you cited they collect is likely for diagnostic purposes to address any problems with their service. None of the data they collect can be traced back to the end-user individually.
Yes, I was asked to sign into a BitPay account in order to see/pay the invoice. I am not sure why there is a difference in user experience. It is possible it has something to do with the fact that restaurants tend to deal with a lot of cash, and businesses that deal with a lot of cash tend to be a higher risk of money laundering.

I would point out that BitPay has said, as recently as last month that customers making payments under $3,000 do not need to provide KYC verification, and only need to verify their email address.

I made a post about Kape a few months ago here - https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.58547859. As I say in that post, whether or not they were personally responsible for the malware is more or less irrelevant. There are plenty of other very compelling reasons that you should under no circumstances use any of their products or those of their subsidiaries.

They were trying to buy real food.

The site in question is https://www.thuisbezorgd.nl. This is the same company which runs Grubhub in the states, Menulog in Australia/NZ, and Takeaway.com/Just Eat across the rest of Europe. You can try it out yourself (English language version available from the menu in the top right) with fake details. Even an order for under 10 euros requires a KYCed BitPay account.

BitPay is not their only payment provider. In addition to accepting BitPay, they also accept bitcoin from another payment provider, whose identity is unclear (it could be something they host themselves).

Based on some quick research, it does appear that Kape Technologies could be a shady company. Although it is unclear if the malware that was being distributed was created by them or if they were serving as somewhat of an app store without the code being reviewed by the company hosting the app store.

In your example of BitPay requiring KYC for a $10 pizza, was the person trying to buy a gift card to a pizza chain (presumably with the intention of using the gift card to buy pizza)? Or were they trying to buy a pizza from the pizza chain, using BitPay as a payment provider?

The difference is important. Gift cards are similar to cash and have money laundering-related risks that cash has. While it is usually trivial to sell and transfer a gift card, it is not trival to resell a pizza (pizza has a short shelf life once cooked), or a VPN subscription.

Mozilla made a tweet reminding everyone that they accept crypto, and the Twitter trolls lost their collective mind. People don't actually care, they just wanted to virtue signal that they were absolutely disgusted, all while using another platform which is pushing ahead with bitcoin integration (Twitter).

That's different. Tesla's rapidly flipping position is simply Elon Musk trying to manipulate the markets. Mozilla aren't trying to do that (and indeed, do not have the number of followers nor the right followers (i.e. morons) to do this).

I'm confused now; I didn't know whether Mozilla was accepting bitcoin for quite a long time now since 2014. Is it true? If it's, why this has created such chaos now on Twitter. Why didn't create that chaos long ago?

Maybe for the same reason, Tesla started to accept Bitcoin & later stopped. BTW, there's a rumor ongoing that Tesla will accept DOGE now LOL.

PIA has become a VPN to avoid at all costs since it was taken over by the incredibly shady and anti-privacy Kape Technologies, but it is still pretty hilarious that any company with "private" in their name would choose to use BitPay. A symbol of how far they have fallen, I guess.

Perhaps as well if there is a physical product being shipped? It seems you were able to make a donation or sign up for a VPN subscription without being asked for KYC, but you and Reddit users are being asked for KYC for buying hardware wallets or pizza. I don't understand otherwise why they would allow a $2500 donation without KYC but refuse a $10 pizza.