Topic: Removal of escrow.ms? Update: Recommend users for DT 2, as escrow.ms is removed - page 14. (Read 19834 times)

There are few things to it........ the same way it happened with Ross Ulbricht, he confessed under duress, in India there is no 5th amendment or in short no protection against self incrimination. If we all take everything that has been reported as true, then why are we ignoring the trivias. For instance The Joint Commissioner of Police (source http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/Card-fraud-Cybercriminals-using-bitcoins-to-trade-money/articleshow/50927536.cms?)categorically says that Bitcoin as a form of payment is illegal in India as decreed by Reserve bank of India - which is utter rubbish. Police arrested Pankaj as they do not have any other scape goat. He is arrested because he has dealt in bitcoins and failed to ascertain the motive of the people involved in the trade. The same way Charlie Shrem got indicted - allegedly supplying bitcoin to drug dealers. They arrested him because he failed to ascertain the motive of the people who bought bitcoins. So, the case is, if I sell knives and some one buys one to commit murder, then I am a party to the crime - is this fair.

The point which everyone alludes to is - Police in India has deemed Bitcoin buying and selling illegal (in cash or through bank channels) sooner or later you will find users getting rounded up for using bitcoins. Pankaj received money and sent Bitcoins in return that is his only crime. His honesty in deals and on localbitcoins is above reproach. He is not a guy to get involved in card fraud. He was used and dumped.

It is easy to label someone as a scammer, there are many who have dealt with pankaj on this forum as well as on localbitcoins. He dealt with someone in cash and that someone turned out to be a carder. He is not a carder neither a scammer. Wait for the outcome of the trial - if he is allowed one.

It's irreverent if he was the highest-up in the operation, he was getting a cut and in exchange he helped to move the money.  There's no denying that his insane reputation on here must have made his trades much easier to make. 

Guys stop trolling,I hope you all get DT1 and 5000 trust score but for fuck's sake be a logical grown up person when you post.

The article says he is doing this since 4-5 months and have sent X amount of money to Y persons and if we go back 5 months we see him

• Doing several trades with grtthegreat and not scamming him.
  
• Neg-Tagging a newbie for scam ads ioobileszon
  
• Trade with zazarb
  
• Neg-Tagging another scammer rickday
  
• Neg-Tagging hacked account torepia
  
• Neg-Tagging another scammer Morchid
  
  The above ratings are given only by .MS and none other DT guy so it was his own opinion and was not influenced.Of,course he could have pulled much coins but he didn't.
  
  IMO he might have thought that the card fraud's are going to do this either with him or without him and no-one can get the victim's money back to their original cards or banks and in that case if he uses his trading back-up and knowledge to increase the stash in his wallet then it might be crime of course but i don't think it would make him a bad or dishonest or a scammer either.
  
  Considering the above trades on forum while he was doing the cloning thing it seems like he wouldn't have scammed people directly or hurt them or run away with their money when he is trusted and which is a sign of good/reliable character and also taking a cut from the criminals doesn't makes him a dishonest person.
  
  What i think is that the fraud's knew that they are not in INDIA and the police cannot get to them by any means and they pulled .MS into this most risky position(trader) while cashing their bitcoins coins internationally.More or less I think he was SET UP.
  
  
  Quote from: cooldgamer on February 11, 2016, 12:25:38 AM
  cashed out with his illegitimate funds.
  
  There are Bank Officials involved in this and also international criminals ,it was not his own money....lolll

This is why I'm such a strong advocate for multisig escrow.  We really need to make it the norm and get tools for it make it easier to use so even the most 'trusted' escrows can't run off with money.  With first master-p and now this it's showing impossible to trust anybody in the bitcoin world as something besides an arbitrator.  Granted that they could still work with one user to scam, but at least that would be a bit harder to pull off.


I think we fell into his trap by thinking that he had good intentions.  By having such a large amount of trust and being one of the 'best' members in the Bitcoin community, he was probably able to make large trades with ease and not have people question him.  We don't know how much he moved online and IRL, but most people probably wouldn't have batted an eye if he popped up with a ton of money to turn into BTC.

Neither providing escrow nor using a sig campaign costed him anything, so he was making free reputation that could be cashed out with his illegitimate funds.  Smart as fuck.

Yeah, there's no evidence that he did, but Jesus...can anyone be trusted here?  You just never know.  That really sucks.

Wasn't he going to use the proceeds of a sig campaign to reimburse Master-P's victims or something like that?  Seems like he was mixing honesty with extreme dishonesty.  Perplexing.

Crazy that so many "reputable" members turn out to be huge scammers. Can't even trust the escrows here.  I keep my trust list pretty trim and had escrow.ms on it.

Card fraud is a big deal too. He could be going away for awhile...

Maybe they meant the removal from DT and the 'drama' that usually comes after. Question like:Who will take their place; "Do we really need a replacement; Why isn't person X more suitable than person Y?", and similar.

In these cases it is remove first and ask questions later. Only two members have tagged him so far on my list.

As he is arrested, it's clear that any further deals from the account will be from a hacker, or maybe the cops for all we know. So any ratings and feedback(as he's in dt1) would effect the users. Theymos should remove him from dt1 and lock his account as the likelihood of him returning to the forum is pretty slim to none.

I know what happened with him, however I do not see the relevance between him and removing escrow.ms from DT1.

For reference the following accounts will get removed from DT2 if escrow.ms is removed from DT1 as they are solely trusted by him. I'd adopt some of them but I'm DT2 so won't make much difference.

Well, wasn't expecting this. Had a few small deals in the past with escrow.ms . Seemed to be a nice guy. Is he currently holding any escrow amounts?

tldr he was selling spaces into DT2 and refused to even consider reforming his ways: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=990074.0;all

I expect it can, however do we really want this? While he should be remembered as being a good contributor to the forums in the past, he admitted to fraud. I can't say I'm very fond of the idea of a fraudster being automatically trusted by the system.

What I think would be the best way to go on from here would be for existing DT1 members to look through his trust list and determine which users should still be in DT, then adding them to their own trust lists to keep them there. After this, I think that it would be best if escrow.ms was removed from DT completely along with any other inactive/incapable members of DT1. Having dead weight in the default trust list may seem easier now, however it will not further down the line should anything else happen.

What do you mean by this?

A lakh is 100,000 Indian rupees, so Rs 8 lakh=800,000 is about $12,000, 30 lakh $45,000.

Does anyone know how much (in USD and/or BTC) was involved in the alleged thefts? It appears the article in the OP uses some kind of abbreviation that makes it difficult to determine how much was stolen. (yes the article says that he admitted guilt, however news articles in the past have been incorrect).

I for one have excluded him from my trust network and have left him negative trust until at least everything can get sorted out, although if there is truth to the article in the OP both will remain. It probably wouldn't be a bad idea for him to get removed from DT1 for the time being, at least because he will likely not be active to manage his trust list (even if he is not guilty)

latley i saw an ad from the "biggest exchange" in india. i tried to get some companys paid via bitpay but they refused it

True. And though I dont like Pankaj, I really hope he comes out of this. I'm not much aware of Indian laws, but going by the news, it seems like he'll be trialed under terrorist financing laws, which will most likely be demonic.

If all this is true.. belive me, that his Bitcointalk accout, is his smallest problem now.

This is what happens with bitcoin. A bitcoin user, highly trusted can be an illegal carder. Ty anonymity.


Wait... Does that mean bitcoin is illegal in India?

^OK. Just read this statement "Bhardwaj revealed to us that Sheikh would procure data related to debit/credit cards through his sources," said DCP (crime) Bhisham Singh. "His associates would clone the cards and withdraw the money and send it to Delhi. Sheikh instructed Bhardwaj to transmit the money to Dubai through the bitcoin route."

Means he's completely at fault here. I thought he was only dealing in person and was unaware of the debit card scam.