Topic: mtgox requires physical identification - page 3. (Read 10175 times)

And the bigger it gets and the more markets it expands into, the more it's going to have to comply with all sorts of financial services regulations and AML/CTF/KYC laws.  This might piss people off, but they get more pissed off when they can't get their funds because Mt Gox accounts are frozen due to suspicious activity.  If the exchanges don't comply with AML requirements, everyone's money which is held in their accounts is at risk of being frozen.  

It's amazing that Mt Gox managed to operate for so long before this became an issue really.  I expect that all the exchanges hoped they'd be able to fly under the radar for quite a bit longer.  It takes considerable staff time and therefore costs money to verify accounts to comply with AML requirements and I'm sure the exchanges would rather not be bearing those costs during their start-up period.

The time has probably come where all of the exchanges need to have user agreements which clearly state that their customers may be required to verify their accounts and/or their identity at any time and that if they fail to do so their funds will not be released.  The problem is that people rarely read complex user agreements such as those of PayPal and Technocash until access to their funds has been blocked.  Even if the exchanges do have complex, multi-page user agreements I suspect that people are still going to bitch when the terms of those agreements are enforced.

I'm not sure about elsewhere in the world, but I know that here when a customer refuses to verify their account and/or identity to a business like PayPal or another financial service provider, the funds in their account must be transferred to one of the government unclaimed money funds after a certain period of time.  

Can't you just cancel and get back your money without those hassles?

It brokes his earlier promises.

Just as example,
also I asked them about the possibility to transfer rubles - they said "yes" then "no":
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/he-mtgox-48140
I was forced to convert money twice - from USD to RUR and from RUR after that.
They get the comission and don't return it (wrong advice was their fault, not mine).



I don't want to withdraw USD, I want to withdraw BTC.
How will I prove my identity with photo and home address, if it is completely unrelated to my nickname?
Should I provide notarial signs on all the screenshots of my internet provider accounts?

The 'Magic: The Gathering Online Exchange'  is acting more and more like Paypal these days. People have been reporting about this for months, so you can't say that you weren't warned. I hope that you can get access to your money, but I fear that without full disclosure, your funds will be sucked into the Mark Karpeles' legal slush-fund.

I'm not so worried when mtgox decided to act like a traditional financial institution, which will collect the identity information of the people.

Bitcoin is money, if mtgox want to act like an serious bitcoin financial institution, some traditional best practice is in the best interest of mtgox and the bitcoin economy.

However, this will not danger the bitcoin ideology, you can always spend and transfer bitcoin anonymously.

This somehow like the gun things in America. The people is free to hold guns, so that ppl is able to fight with the government when the gov becomes evil. but ppl are not shoot at gov everyday.

we can spend bitcoin in a P2P way, and hide our identity from everyone in the world. But we don't have to do this all the time. and mtgox is just giving us the other choice, where mtgox may need some of our identity information.

give the ID information or not, use mtgox or not, it's your call. but some ppl will like to trust mtgox, to got some convenience. just like ppl are free to give information to facebook and google. like it or not, most ppl do it this way.

so don't judge, you can warn ppl the risk in trust such elephant, but mtgox does nothing that wrong.

 If you want to spend bitcoin anonymously, fine, then don't try to convert it into USD on the mtgox, just spend it.

If you like to hide all the trace of your bitcoin, you'd better stock some bitcoin for emergence  use, donot think in when-need-bitcoin-I-will-just-buy-it-then way. Yes, you'd better "hoard" some on your personal wallet or you have to leak you personal information to mtgox.

I hear this more and more and it makes me nervous.

If you have to take people's private information you do it upfront. It is BS to take money and hold it ransom. They know it costs them customers that's why the obtrusive requests come afterwards.

When I tried to move 5 BTC out of mtgox (to glbse) mtgox says me:

"Your account is currently pending review, please visit https://mtgox.com/forms/verification"

and on that page there is only one option - to reveal physical identity (no way to go without this).

I expect that for sums below 100 BTC one can withdraw "anonymously".

Earlier I asked them to increase withdrawal limit, but after they requested my ID,
I decide not to give ID to mtgox -> japanese government -> american government.
This is why I decline their offer of yubikey delivery (delivery requires physical address).
And they already did "password recovery" after their hack.
I had a strong password which was used only on their site exclusively.
The hack was their fault, not mine. But they forced me to give some my details that time.
(By mail request of 2011 June 24)

They seems to be very intrusive in attempts to get personal details (under the name of "my protection")...
Identification is not a problem for me, but it destroys one of major bitcoin ideas.

The problem of course, that i have much more money in mtgox account.

UPD: they replied to this topic (in support.mtgox.com site):
I want to hear reason.

My proposition: I still own wallets and addresses, which I used to transfer funds in.
I can use the old address to receive BTC, which i use to send BTC to mtgox.

UPD2: After I submit my documents, both my requests was closed with comments:

Now I am waiting for 5 business days for document checking, as written in the site.

UPD3:
I gave him international passport, which have translations to english (within the document itself).
and domestic bill (as they requested).
Of course the bill was in domestic language.

I received (2011-Oct-24) an email:

UPD4:
I upload notarized translations (that cost me ~30 BTC equivalent as a reward to the translator and notarius) and reopen ticket.
Ticket was closed with comment:
I wrote a letter to that email address.
Start waiting for five days.