All this talk about how Bitcoin's anonymity features enables crime misses an important fact: those same features enable us to fight crime.
Community watch groups can post rewards for information leading to the arrest of a criminal, and offer to pay the person who provided the information anonymously with Bitcoin.
This would allow people to do things such as take a picture of someone engaged in criminal activity, and upload it to the Crime Stopper's website, with a bitcoin address embedded in the picture. If the criminal is then caught, the community watch group would send the reward to the bitcoin address without having to meet the recipient or get their banking details.
Anonymous payments reduce the risk for people reporting crimes and receiving rewards for the information they provide. It increases the ability to fight crime in a decentralized fashion. It reduces the ability of violent and dangerous individuals to keep those in their community silent through fear.
Community watch groups can post rewards for information leading to the arrest of a criminal, and offer to pay the person who provided the information anonymously with Bitcoin.
This would allow people to do things such as take a picture of someone engaged in criminal activity, and upload it to the Crime Stopper's website, with a bitcoin address embedded in the picture. If the criminal is then caught, the community watch group would send the reward to the bitcoin address without having to meet the recipient or get their banking details.
Anonymous payments reduce the risk for people reporting crimes and receiving rewards for the information they provide. It increases the ability to fight crime in a decentralized fashion. It reduces the ability of violent and dangerous individuals to keep those in their community silent through fear.
This forum really needs a built-in puking smiley.