Samourai Wallet seized by the feds - page 4.

alani123

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Quote from: Kruw on April 26, 2024, 06:11:48 AM

You may currently be annoyed by what I said, but I would tell other people to stop attacking Wasabi too if there were arrests made to their developers.

I'll start. I'd like to offer my sincere apologies and take back any statements I had made against Wasabi wallet and the people behind it, including you personally.

My understanding at the time was limited and based on falsehoods and misunderstandings perpetuated by other people as well. I regret having been one of such people at a time.
I think I now have a better understanding of what each proponent in bitcoin's privacy space represent and Really do understand where the Wassabi team are coming from.
In my view, Wassabi is a net-positive proponent for bitcoin's privacy uses and have started greatly appreciating the team for their efforts.

And to anyone else in this thread, I think that we should all acknowledge that Kruw personally has been offering level headed fact-based answers here for so long in spite of so many attacks he and the project have been receiving. Wassabi is offering one of the best bitcoin privacy solutions that can realistically be provided now, and we have to recognize and appreciate that.

Kruw

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Quote from: Wind_FURY on April 26, 2024, 12:23:25 AM

I'm not stopping you from having an opinion, or am I calling for you to stop posting what you believe is right and what you believe is the truth. I merely letting you understand that real people were arrested. They have families, and they don't want to be in their current situation. I'm also asking you to PLEASE, keep quiet about Samourai for just a few days.

You may currently be annoyed by what I said, but I would tell other people to stop attacking Wasabi too if there were arrests made to their developers.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Why don't you tell people to stop attacking Wasabi even though their developers weren't arrested?

Quote from: NotATether on April 26, 2024, 12:45:25 AM

Come back to us after you've disassociated yourself from Wasabi Wallet and then you can tell us "I told you so".

Lmao, what? This is a basic truth that anyone who knows anything about Bitcoin privacy has been warning about since Samourai began spying on their users' xpubs. There's vindication across the board:

https://twitter.com/francispouliot_/status/1783245807170224291

https://twitter.com/heavilyarmedc/status/1783273530257244235

https://twitter.com/Mandrik/status/1783235201281216652

https://twitter.com/nvk/status/1783257921779822665

https://twitter.com/mononautical/status/1783215740079727064

https://twitter.com/sethx86/status/1783304959255073231

Quote from: ABCbits on April 26, 2024, 03:44:52 AM

Could you explain to us why you claim Monero is shitcoin? After all, Monero is one of few altcoins which usually not associated with such term.

You don't need Monero because you can transact privately on Bitcoin.

Quote from: mindrust on April 26, 2024, 04:02:42 AM

Litecoin has a built-in privacy tool too. It is optional to use but it is there if you need it. That way litecoin has the best of the both worlds. It is not going to targeted by the government and businesses (they may not accept ltc that use mimble-wimble though) and it is not always semi-anonymous like bitcoin. You have a choice.

No need to use a 3rd party mixer/coincoin etc

https://www.elliptic.co/blog/explaining-mimblewimble-the-privacy-upgrade-to-litecoin?hs_amp=true

A viable alternative imo.

Mimblewimble doesn't provide privacy against an active observer since they can see all the transactions at the time they are created.

SickDayIn

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The distinguishing reason I believe that these privacy related cryptocurrency ventures get taken down by government, particularly the US government, is because they knowingly contribute to or profit from criminal activity. Based on the DOJ website you linked, there is evidence that Samurai Wallet was aware their product was used by criminals, and they assisted grey/black market activity. Privacy tools will no doubt be used by operations like this, but their owners need to make sure they do not benefit from it.

mindrust

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Litecoin has a built-in privacy tool too. It is optional to use but it is there if you need it. That way litecoin has the best of the both worlds. It is not going to targeted by the government and businesses (they may not accept ltc that use mimble-wimble though) and it is not always semi-anonymous like bitcoin. You have a choice.

No need to use a 3rd party mixer/coincoin etc

https://www.elliptic.co/blog/explaining-mimblewimble-the-privacy-upgrade-to-litecoin?hs_amp=true

A viable alternative imo.

ABCbits

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Quote from: Kruw on April 25, 2024, 06:23:21 AM

Quote from: dkbit98 on April 25, 2024, 06:12:58 AM

Make money private by default = Monero.
Just sayin.

You don't need shitcoins for privacy. Wasabi Wallet, BTCPay Server's coinjoin plugin, and Trezor's coinjoin account all provide privacy by default for Bitcoin.

Could you explain to us why you claim Monero is shitcoin? After all, Monero is one of few altcoins which usually not associated with such term.

Quote from: OgNasty on April 25, 2024, 07:30:21 PM

From reading on this forum it sounds like people have a completely different idea of the services provided from what is in the fed documents. If what people here believe is true, it’s possible the devs will beat this case. I have my doubts though. This sort of seizure doesn’t typically happen unless there are mountains of evidence.

Yeah, i never hear about feature "Samourai Premium Add Ons" even though i've read Samourai Wallet documentation few times and read some discussion about Samourai Wallet. PDF (mentioned on the press release) doesn't even mention link/webpage source, so we can't verify whether it's true or not.

Dave1

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Quote from: NotATether on April 26, 2024, 12:45:25 AM

Quote from: Kruw on April 25, 2024, 10:41:46 AM

Quote from: Wind_FURY on April 25, 2024, 10:10:49 AM

OK, I believe this proves that the Samourai developers are NOT working for state actors, and the project itself is NOT a honeypot collecting information for intelligence agencies. This is a very sad day for Bitcoin privacy advocates. Kruw, some of your fellow developers were arrested, move on for today. Debate again tomorrow.

Why do you think it's too early to say "I told you so"? Samourai deliberately designed their wallet to collect user data by default and lied about it: https://twitter.com/SamouraiWallet/status/1576923638846005248

I opened an issue to have a warning displayed to users about the data they are leaking, Samourai closed it and later deleted it: https://web.archive.org/web/20230417145554/https://code.samourai.io/wallet/samourai-wallet-android/-/issues/458

I've spent an enormous amount of time warning people about the risks involved with this exact outcome. Now whatever data Samourai had is within arms reach of the Feds.

Come back to us after you've disassociated yourself from Wasabi Wallet and then you can tell us "I told you so". Until then, your project is inside the giant crosshairs of the FBI: https://www.ic3.gov/Media/Y2024/PSA240425

Yeah, and so for others who 'supposedly' want to check,

For example, I type 'Coinbase' in the Legal Name textbox, and this will be the result,

pooya87

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Quote from: OgNasty on April 25, 2024, 07:30:21 PM

We’ll have to wait and see if they are actually convicted of a crime.

Does it even matter? For those individuals, of course but not for Bitcoin.

What this act achieves is scaring every programmer out there from even contributing to anything privacy related since they now know the anti-privacy dictatorship can traumatize them and their families like this. Not to mention all the huge legal fees these "programmers" have to pay.
Speaking of traumatizing families and legal fees, lets not forget this is not a new thing in USA. Lest we forget arrest of BurtW basically just because he was a bitcoin user...

NotATether

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Quote from: Kruw on April 25, 2024, 10:41:46 AM

Quote from: Wind_FURY on April 25, 2024, 10:10:49 AM

OK, I believe this proves that the Samourai developers are NOT working for state actors, and the project itself is NOT a honeypot collecting information for intelligence agencies. This is a very sad day for Bitcoin privacy advocates. Kruw, some of your fellow developers were arrested, move on for today. Debate again tomorrow.

Why do you think it's too early to say "I told you so"? Samourai deliberately designed their wallet to collect user data by default and lied about it: https://twitter.com/SamouraiWallet/status/1576923638846005248

I opened an issue to have a warning displayed to users about the data they are leaking, Samourai closed it and later deleted it: https://web.archive.org/web/20230417145554/https://code.samourai.io/wallet/samourai-wallet-android/-/issues/458

I've spent an enormous amount of time warning people about the risks involved with this exact outcome. Now whatever data Samourai had is within arms reach of the Feds.

Come back to us after you've disassociated yourself from Wasabi Wallet and then you can tell us "I told you so". Until then, your project is inside the giant crosshairs of the FBI: https://www.ic3.gov/Media/Y2024/PSA240425

Wind_FURY

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Quote from: Kruw on April 25, 2024, 10:41:46 AM

Quote from: Wind_FURY on April 25, 2024, 10:10:49 AM

OK, I believe this proves that the Samourai developers are NOT working for state actors, and the project itself is NOT a honeypot collecting information for intelligence agencies. This is a very sad day for Bitcoin privacy advocates. Kruw, some of your fellow developers were arrested, move on for today. Debate again tomorrow.

Why do you think it's too early to say "I told you so"? Samourai deliberately designed their wallet to collect user data by default and lied about it: https://twitter.com/SamouraiWallet/status/1576923638846005248

I opened an issue to have a warning displayed to users about the data they are leaking, Samourai closed it and later deleted it: https://web.archive.org/web/20230417145554/https://code.samourai.io/wallet/samourai-wallet-android/-/issues/458

I've spent an enormous amount of time warning people about the risks involved with this exact outcome. Now whatever data Samourai had is within arms reach of the Feds.

I'm not stopping you from having an opinion, or am I calling for you to stop posting what you believe is right and what you believe is the truth. I merely letting you understand that real people were arrested. They have families, and they don't want to be in their current situation. I'm also asking you to PLEASE, keep quiet about Samourai for just a few days.

You may currently be annoyed by what I said, but I would tell other people to stop attacking Wasabi too if there were arrests made to their developers.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

OgNasty

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We’ll have to wait and see if they are actually convicted of a crime. From reading on this forum it sounds like people have a completely different idea of the services provided from what is in the fed documents. If what people here believe is true, it’s possible the devs will beat this case. I have my doubts though. This sort of seizure doesn’t typically happen unless there are mountains of evidence.

Eclipse33

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I heard the news about Samourai devs being seized by the feds and nearly vomited in my mouth.

DO YOU PEOPLE NOT SEE WHERE THIS IS ALL GOING. WE ARE GOING TO BE LIVING IN AN OPEN AIR PRISON.

The case against Samourai will no doubt take YEARS to resolve, and the case will be RAILROADED into oblivion if they plead not guilty.

Either way, these talented men will not see the light of day for DECADES over this.

They will never be able to write a line of code again. Their lives destroyed by the out of control, unaccountable criminal government.

Bitcoin-fog mixer and now Samourai. To the Feds reading this, WHO IS NEXT ON YOUR HIT LIST???

Government locking these innocent men up is a DISGRACE and an attack on every single bitcoiner.

buwaytress

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Quote from: BlackHatCoiner on April 25, 2024, 09:00:56 AM

Quote from: buwaytress on April 25, 2024, 06:45:38 AM

Can anyone see a silver lining?

I personally can't. Samourai wasn't a custodial mixer, so that to say this seizure encouraged the adoption of self-custodial solutions, or whatever. Samourai was one of the best and cheap solutions to coinjoin most effectively and self-custodially. Now the second best, IMO, is XMR swap, and I dare to add, XMR in general as it embodies the true spirit of cypherpunks, which Bitcoin failed to. The only problem is that Bitcoin appreciates more in capital than Monero.

Always held Monero with respect, and now that you mentioned it, am wondering why no one's gone for their devs or taken down their gits or whatever. Suppose it helps they have never really gathered the capital or volume as you say.

One must hope "this is not the end" but to bring back the silver lining question I asked and to answer myself, perhaps this is one more reason for people to attempt a "return" to basics. Hurts me personally a little to see recent cypherpunk headlines talking about Pavel instead of some other Bitcoin or even Monero relation.

FinneysTrueVision

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Quote from: BlackHatCoiner on April 25, 2024, 09:00:56 AM

Quote from: Kruw on April 25, 2024, 06:48:35 AM

You're lying, Wasabi's privacy software isn't broken. If you aren't lying, then prove it by tracing this Wasabi coinjoin:

This is not another Wasabi thread. I'm not attempting to de-anonymize Wasabi, all the evidence of people who used it and got caught speak for itself, but I know you'll blame the users that "they didn't use it correctly".

Those accusations are disingenuous and have been debunked numerous times already. The PlusToken scammers weren’t caught because they used Wasabi, they got caught because they were operating a ponzi scheme. Moreover, it’s well known they didn’t use Wasabi but instead a modified client they coded to specifically allow reusing the same address. A larger portion of their BTC was self-mixed, poorly, via repetitive UTXO splitting and merging. Also, they were using centralized exchanges which had their KYC information.

The Twitter hackers also used centralized exchanges as well as custodial mixers which you promoted and endorsed, yet I don’t see ChipMixer being blamed for their arrest.

Quote

Any user who shared their xpub should consider themselves traced already

This was repeatedly downplayed by their developers and their fanatical reply guys on social media. Anybody who dared to call it a vulnerability was relentlessly trolled. They had no regard for the possibility of exposing users to this risk, just as long as they were still collecting their fees, that’s all that mattered.

coolcoinz

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Quote from: Wind_FURY on April 25, 2024, 10:10:49 AM

OK, I believe this proves that the Samourai developers are NOT working for state actors, and the project itself is NOT a honeypot collecting information for intelligence agencies. This is a very sad day for Bitcoin privacy advocates. Kruw, some of your fellow developers were arrested, move on for today. Debate again tomorrow.

As for the honeypot, we're yet to find out what information they get from there, how well the servers were protected and so on. I'm not an expert here, but I've read that they had their own nodes and most of their users did not use them.

As for the US government, It's a great example of double standards where a person can kill another person and get 10 years, while these guys are facing 20 (correct me if I'm wrong) for running a privacy oriented software! That's insane.
At the same time Jamie Dimon's bank was FINED for money laundering. Why aren't these devs let go with a fine? Because the government rules with fear and likes to make examples of people to scare the rest.

cryptosize

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These mofos ain't lying:

Welcome to 2030. I own nothing, have no privacy, and life has never been better

https://medium.com/world-economic-forum/welcome-to-2030-i-own-nothing-have-no-privacy-and-life-has-never-been-better-ee2eed62f710
https://twitter.com/wef/status/809424034169581568

Just look at her eyes... do you think she has a sane mind? Shocked

Techno-Communism (AI/robots + CBDC + UBI) will require abolition of privacy, that's why they're taking everything down.

https://twitter.com/sethforprivacy/status/1783270473121382845

Quote

Use Monero for spending, keep using Bitcoin for savings

NotATether

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Quote from: bitmover on April 25, 2024, 11:22:59 AM

I think US government should also look closer at all that NFT money laundry industries. Specially ordinals and Runes.

No one can convince me that this single satoshi is worth 2.1 million to anyone. This is money laundry
https://decrypt.co/228084/bitcoin-epic-sat-halving-sells-over-2-1-million

Quote

The first satoshi mined on Bitcoin after the halving, one of just four "epic sats" to date, fetched 33.3 BTC at auction. Here's why.

They are going to clean out white-collar crime nationwide before they investigate Ordinals and NFTs. which is a fancy way of saying they won't do it.

Sorry but that's just the reality of how the FBI and SEC are ran.

bitmover

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Quote from: BlackHatCoiner on April 24, 2024, 02:57:19 PM

Samourai Wallet has been taken down by the U.S. authorities: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/founders-and-ceo-cryptocurrency-mixing-service-arrested-and-charged-money-laundering. You can verify by opening samouraiwallet.com (it's under the authorities' control).

I think US government should also look closer at all that NFT money laundry industries. Specially ordinals and Runes.

No one can convince me that this single satoshi is worth 2.1 million to anyone. This is money laundry
https://decrypt.co/228084/bitcoin-epic-sat-halving-sells-over-2-1-million

Quote

The first satoshi mined on Bitcoin after the halving, one of just four "epic sats" to date, fetched 33.3 BTC at auction. Here's why.

joker_josue

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Quote from: JackpotRacer on April 25, 2024, 11:01:37 AM

Yes, the Russian move was a very bad idea and I am really surprised about it and I would like to know what was the reason for it.

Pure marketing and with the aim of obtaining more customers and financial return.

Imagine if Satoshi in the Genesis block had said "currency created to avoid taxes". Do you think Bitcoin had reached this day without major complications? Logically not.

The problem is when people exaggerate how far they can go, and end up exposing themselves too much.

This is reminiscent of what happened with torrents and PirateBay. Why was this the most followed torrent site to date? Because it was what was most exposed and clearly shown to the public as a way to obtain paid content for free. Today, torrent sites continue to exist, but as they do not expose themselves to that level, they manage to go unnoticed. And with constant small adjustments, they manage to avoid the actions of the authorities. They are not free from being caught, but it ends up being different.

SlamDunkIT

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BlackHatCoiner, great choice to quote Satoshi, I love to see advice and wisdom from our founder. Also R.I.P. Samouri Wallet, something new and better will come along to replace you.

Quote from: BlackHatCoiner on April 24, 2024, 02:57:19 PM

Samourai Wallet has been taken down by the U.S. authorities: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/founders-and-ceo-cryptocurrency-mixing-service-arrested-and-charged-money-laundering. You can verify by opening samouraiwallet.com (it's under the authorities' control).

Another privacy enhancing tool goes down the road. Apparently, the governments use everything in their disposal to undermine the users' privacy. Samourai team had recently announced that they were developing a decentralized version of whirlpool, using the Soroban network. It could be the case that they foresaw their own disappearance.

Very frustrated. An important reminder and good quote is needed here.

Quote from: satoshi

>You will not find a solution to political problems in cryptography.

Yes, but we can win a major battle in the arms race and gain a new territory of freedom for several years.

Governments are good at cutting off the heads of a centrally controlled networks like Napster, but pure P2P networks like Gnutella and Tor seem to be holding their own.

R.I.P. Samourai.

Kruw

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Quote from: JackpotRacer on April 25, 2024, 11:01:37 AM

Yes, the Russian move was a very bad idea and I am really surprised about it and I would like to know what was the reason for it.

Geopolitics aside, they openly encouraged hackers to use their service: https://twitter.com/SamouraiWallet/status/1610484148057120768

Topic: Samourai Wallet seized by the feds - page 4. (Read 1994 times)