It should not need to be said that I am not giving advice here. However...
The primary reason why I avoid “KYC” is that I will not answer these questions. On principle. [...]
as to my private wallets, what happens there, stays there.
It should not need to be said that I am not giving advice here. However...
The primary reason why I avoid “KYC” is that I will not answer these questions. On principle.
Surely interesting points, and I hope that you are not overdoing matters. I probably have communicated with you about this matter previously, but in my thinkening there can be some advantages (and even practicality, me thinks) in having a foot in both worlds, and I would hope that you would have something like that going on, as well...
In my country, there is an exchange which I use, which gives me a call about once a year. They ask the same questions, I always give them the same answers, which are generic or vague. If they need something specific, I also have an answer for that as well.
The truth is they will never really know, but at least I keep them satisfied so they don't fry my accounts.
I think the trick is not that you are invisible or anonymous, but something along hiding in plain sight, and below the radar.
I have no idea about your particular situations, and
I do not want to know. The following applies only to me. YMMV.
A part of the problem is that if I were to do as you say, then I may need to lie (whether explicitly or by omission). As it stands, where I am located, to the best of my knowledge, I am not doing anything whatsoever illegal. Whereas I may trap myself, if I tried to answer any questions that I refuse to answer. Moreover, TPTB probably know that some Bitcoiners don’t spill the beans. I am not on any lists for potential audits or targeted surveillance
as to this (albeit almost certainly on many other little lists—enough for me!).
I think of it like cash. I am not doing anything otherwise illegal; and there is no law against my possessing a significant quantity of legally obtained cash
(although it may be uncomfortable if I were found with it—so much for the honesty of laws...). I would not place myself in a position ever to be asked questions about whether or not I keep cash, what I do with it, etc.
None of your business.In my situation, the golden silence that I achieve by avoiding “KYC” exchanges altogether can never be held against me—not in theory, and not in practice.
O, what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!
Furthermore,
I don’t give the “KYC” exchanges any profit; I am effectually boycotting the rat-bastards.Thus, I lead a different kind of double life with “a foot in both worlds” as naïve nocoiner, and a secret Bitcoin fanatic.
During the December 2017 pump, some idiot who knows me as a moderately adequate tech enthusiast e-mailed me to ask my opinion of Bitcoin. I replied dismissively:
It’s all bullshit, it will crash, don’t bother with it. I figured that anyone stupid enough to e-mail my IRL identity about Bitcoin from a
@gmail.com address does not deserve Bitcoin, anyway. Protip: If you want an honest answer, ask me in private!
If I had at least an order of magnitude more money than I actually have, then I may not be able to pull this off whilst satisfying my desire to hoard as many magic coins as I can. (“Focus on the IF.”) So, if you are
richer than I am not too poor, then you may need a different strategy.
Historic CurrencyOn a related note:
In the modern world, never show too much intelligence. Smart plus principled equals dangerous.High-IQ weaklings who are subservient to the system, or who compromise with it, are
useful. Smart men who refuse to compromise are
ipso facto undesirable threats.
Smart plus principled equals “evil”, worse than “criminal”.* nullius keeps his brain hidden under the mattress, with his bitcoins and some private photos of trysts with Phryne.