Why didn't the government leave Silk Road open... - page 4.

Bizmark13

sr. member

Activity: 462

Merit: 250

OK, but those coins don't actually belong to the Government though. They belong to the users of Silk Road. If I bought some drugs and gave the dealer $5 and was caught, that $5 note as well as the wallet in my pocket that contains a few more dollar bills, some credit cards, my drivers license, etc. is still mine, is it not?

Also not all of the trading that was going on was illegal:

Quote from: Wikipedia

There were also legal goods and services for sale, such as apparel, art, books, cigarettes, erotica, jewellery, and writing services.

Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_%28marketplace%29

hua_hui

legendary

Activity: 1386

Merit: 1016

Because the officials will say the bitcoin is involved in the ilegal trades and will be confiscated. I think no users will publicly claim the stuck fund from FBI or made some complain with the high risk of exposing their identity!

futureofbitcoin

sr. member

Activity: 322

Merit: 250

... because buying and selling illegal stuff is illegal??? ... Those criminals are lucky they're not caught and put in jail. Or executed in another country.

Bizmark13

sr. member

Activity: 462

Merit: 250

...to allow people to withdraw their coins?

Once the government identified Ross Ulbricht and had control of the Silk Road servers, why didn't they keep the site open so that people could withdraw their bitcoins? They could have blocked the ability to trade (so as to not facilitate any drug deals) and instead only allow people to log onto their accounts at the site and withdraw their funds to their own Bitcoin addresses.

This is the part I'm talking about:

Quote from: ExtremeTech

Funds held by users of the site, however, were not so well-protected. Before completing transactions on the Silk Road, users would load Bitcoins into an escrow account on the site. The agreed upon coins would only be transferred to the seller’s private wallet once the buyer had verified delivery of the goods. When the feds took over the Silk Road, there were over 26,000 Bitcoins in user accounts that were relatively easy to snatch up.

The FBI has transferred all 26,000-plus seized Bitcoins to its own personal wallet, but because Bitcoin transactions are tracked publicly, it didn’t take the internet long to find the FBI’s wallet address. Users have taken to transferring tiny fractions of a Bitcoin to the FBI with public comments attached decrying the war on drugs and the arrest of Ulbricht. Users have even helpfully tagged the wallet address as “Silkroad Seized Coins.” You can check out the comments as they come in by watching the blockchain for the FBI’s wallet.

Link: http://www.extremetech.com/computing/168139-fbi-unable-to-seize-600000-bitcoins-from-silk-road-operator

Topic: Why didn't the government leave Silk Road open... - page 4. (Read 3642 times)