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Anatomy of a $40M+ Bitcoin heist
- yardie 13y agoInteresting. What's $40MM in bitcoin? I ask because most of these articles are trying to shock you with the exchange value rather than the BTC value.
- alexkus 13y agoArticle says 5500BTC.
- betterunix 13y agoThe overwhelming majority of Bitcoin users are concerned with the exchange value, so it makes sense to give that rather than the "native" value.
- interstitial 13y agoSo you're saying it's not a currency, but a speculative play?
- justin 13y agoFor most buyers of bitcoin currently, yes. In the future that might change.
- ceejayoz 13y agoHow is it any different from "one ton of gold" versus "$40 million in gold"? Surely the latter provides more useful information to the general public?
- AsymetricCom 13y ago"Useful" for somebody, sure. I don't think that fact has any use for the pubic.
- kelnos 13y agoGold is generally less volatile, so saying "$40mm in gold" would likely have some lasting significance. But in a month, that $40mm in Bitcoin could be worth $20mm or $60mm or something else entirely. Giving the actual value in BTC would let us know how much exactly.
- celticninja 13y ago96000 btc i believe was the figure being thrown around however I also saw 39000 btc at the every early stages and that is much closer to the $40million estimate given in OP.
- elif 13y agoAt first I imagined a prosecutor frustratedly trying to convince a judge of the validity of an audit trail like this... but in reality it would probably just come down to an expert witness testifying that it is valid.
- ChuckMcM 13y agoSo the '324 is FBI on phone handset' comment, is this the FBI transferring $40M from Silk Road wallets to some other wallet? Or is it something else? Also one wonders what is done with the 'evidence' after the case. I could imagine the FBI simply deleting the wallets but does anyone know their actual policy?
- shawabawa3 13y ago> I could imagine the FBI simply deleting the wallets but does anyone know their actual policy? Pretty sure whatever their policy is, it isn't "throw away $150million of seized assets"
- Cthulhu_ 13y agoExcept that it's not $150 million of seized assets, it's a bunch of electronic money that could or would at one point potentially sell for approximately $150 million if there were enough buyers for the offered digital product. What does the FBI or other agencies do with intercepted drug money and criminal possessions? Drugs get destroyed, that much I know, but not sure about the other stuff.
- dublinben 13y agoIn typical cases, money is sent to the U.S Marshalls, and then disposed of according to a judge's instructions. In this case, the FBI can't easily redeem the seized BTC for USD, so it will likely stay in evidence.
- dr_doom 13y agoLike other seized assets they will get repurposed for other investigations. When the feds seize a boat, car, or home they either sell them or use them for operations, undercover and the like.[0] I imagine the btc will be saved until the case is closed then try to be used for other investigations, I don't think the feds would try converting and selling it. [0] http://www.justice.gov/jmd/afp/02fundreport/02_2.html http://www.justice.gov/jmd/afp/02fundreport/02_2.html
- minimax 13y agoOne great thing about bit coin is that all the metadata is available to everyone. You would be hard pressed to make a fancy chart like this with fiat currency.
- krisdol 13y agojust a minor nitpick, but bitcoin is also fiat currency.
- quotha 13y agoBy that, do you mean that bitcoin does not have any intrinsic value?
- praxeologist 13y agoNothing has intrinsic value.
- aeturnum 13y agoI think most people would argue that items with uses other than exchange medium generally have some intrinsic value. A dollar has no intrinsic value, but a dollar bill can be used as kindling. Even if no one values it, you can drink water, etc.
- praxeologist 13y agoDollar bills have some [quite limited IMO] utility like the paper being burned as kindling or, "Oh, aren't these neat scraps of paper". Utility != intrinsic value. Nothing has intrinsic value.
- dasil003 13y agoSo intrinsic value is a myth. Now we are getting philosophical.
- Estragon 13y agoI see no interesting features in this visualization. What part am I supposed to be looking at?
- alanctgardner2 13y agoDoes anyone gain anything from these graph visualisations? The first few times I saw one I was impressed, but this one is so huge and nondescript, I think it's impossible to take much away from it. They're kind of like info graphics; you see a few that make sense, but many more are just jumping on the bandwagon.