The Blockchain

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More fun with the blockchain ...

 

There are already several very lively threads on TL about BTC, etc. etc. :rofl:

... so this one may not get much traction

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have you noticed that illustrations of bitcoin are ‘always’ presented as a gold coin ?

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Ok - "illustrations of bitcoin are ‘always’ presented as a golden coin " was not the blockshackle.

What is the blockshackle?

 

The backbone is Bitcoin is a very public technology called blockchain – it’s an electronic ledger – that holds the record of every transaction ever made. That half-Bitcoin you lost playing dice online in 2015? That funding transaction you made to the casino is embedded in the blockchain, for all eternity.

But days are numbered for crypto-currency criminals. Both the Market and police agencies are realizing the very public nature of blockchains can be used to get a very granular identity for users.

...

Politicians are busy drafting legislation to clamp down on illicit cryptocurrency transactions. Law-enforcement agencies are frantically looking for tools to help combat cryptocurrency money-laundering and other fraudulent transactions.

And businesses are listening and responding to the call:

...[t]here is a bitcoin tracking tool called a blockchain explorer, created by a company called Blockchain Intelligence Group. The website Blockbits is available free to the public.

They have a technology that helps identify Bitcoin/blockchain users.

Blockbits is a tool that can pull information (meta-data in techspeak) out of the blockchain about bitcoin transactions.

Let’s try to explain this screenshot:

1. Every Bitcoin wallet has a long string of alpha-numeric characters as it’s identifier. You can’t get Bitcoin without a wallet. Any information that can be found out about a Bitcoin is of immense interest to law enforcement agencies.

2. Time of transactions i.e. when Bitcoin was sent to this particular wallet. Again, very interesting to know.

3. You can track the transactions back to the sender’s wallet.

4. How much was sent.

Other information we can glean on this particular wallet:

1. It was first seen on the blockchain on August 3rd, 2017.

2. It was last seen on the same day.

3. Two transactions went into the wallet, one in and one out.

4. The wallet currently contains no Bitcoin.

So we can tell this wallet is not very active at all. That is to say, the owner of this wallet just used it to shuffle bitcoin in and out.

Perhaps it’s somebody just playing with Bitcoin for the first time.

But How is This Useful Again?

So, what’s important to note here is not only do we have the Bitcoin transaction identified, we also have the wallet address of the person who sent the bitcoin as well the wallet address of the person who received it.

Now let’s pretend that this Bitcoin transaction was from one criminal to another, some guy looking to buy illegal Kinder chocolate eggs and smuggle them into the US.

Let’s say some nefarious Canadian crook has set up a web site where you can order those illegal (but delicious) Kinder eggs and arrange for a smuggler to bring them right to your door. The crook posts his wallet address on the website with instructions to send 1 Bitcoin (buy in bulk and save) and you will receive one crate of Kinder eggs!

 

Let us assume that the Department of Homeland Security has set up a special task force to cut down on the trafficking of illegal Kinder eggs from Canada to US. They surf to the website and take note of the wallet address.

 

In setting up the sting operation, they use this tool to verify transactions made to the operation, as an independent tool that can be used as evidence in a court of law.

Better yet, they can track the Bitcoin (the “sting” money) to any other wallet, thus making the concept of throwaway wallets almost useless, or at least way less effective. In the past, to evade detection, criminals created dozens of wallets and shuffled Bitcoin between them, to evade the authorities.

 

That is what the Blockchain Intelligence Group guys have freely available on the web. And they have promised more to come.

“We do intend write our block explorer with more features,” says Shone Anstey, President and Co-Founder of Blockchain Intelligence Group.

“Our custom block explorer is written from the ground-up and so gives us full control. It in our feature roadmap, it will be a mini-portal for analytics that everybody can have a look at. We are trying to get something up for 1st or 2nd quarter of next year.”

Be aware that Blockbits is just the free stuff that the B.I.G. team is giving away to the public.

 

Their other paid product at present caters to law-enforcement agencies and so in interviews the co-founders Shone Anstey (President) and Lance Morginn (CEO) were reluctant to show demo of Qlue for the general public.

But I think I’m allowed to say that from what I saw, Qlue is much more powerful than Blockbits. And law enforcement agencies are using Qlue today against Bitcoin criminals.

One last (but very important) thing to know about the B.I.G. They own their code:

“We needed to get back to the fundamentals. Write up the core engine that studies the blockchain as a custom block explorer that gives us total control,” says Shone.

This is what differentiates these guys from the pack. They own their code, not ripping it off from Github. If you look at other blockchain explorers, they have less features and are even buggy.

 

Shone goes so far as to say “Public block explorers do not correctly parse and display all transaction data.”

For example, some Bitcoin wallets need multiple signatures or “confirmations” before they accept Bitcoin. Blockbits can correctly read “multisig” wallets while the other block explorer cannot. When trying to put bad guys away in court, you can’t have bugs like that in your software.

When nobody mainstream was using Bitcoin years ago, there were a lot of…the darker side of humanity using it.

But now that the market cap of all cryptocurrencies in the world is now more than $100 billion US.

Bitcoin itself has a market of $65 billion and the Market—with technologies like Blockbits—and police are making it a more legitimate business venue.

 

Criminals should be very nervous.

Ross Pilot

 

“Criminals should be very nervous.” ?

:confused:

Seems to me everyone should be very nervous.

ALL those ‘private’ transactions are trackable... ALL those transactions become ‘taxable’ shackles ...

 

“...making it a more legitimate business venue”

:confused:

“legitimate” is code word for ____________ ???

 

 

“legitimate” is code for crypto fiat currency backed by nothing.

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snippets

 

...

 

Maybe you know a “Bitcoin millionaire” who bought five hundred

...

 

Oh what the heck - here’s the whole thing

 

...

 

Yet the crypto-hysteria is distracting you from a scary truth no one is talking about.

 

There is every indication that governments, regulators, tax authorities, and the global elite are moving in for the crypto-kill.

 

The future of Bitcoin may be a dystopia in which Big Brother controls what’s called “the blockchain” and decides when and how you can buy or sell anything and everything.

 

Furthermore, cryptocurrency technology could be the very mechanism used by global elites to replace the dollar based financial system.

In 1958, Mao Zedong, the leader of the Communist Party of China and China’s dictatorial leader was confronted with demoralized intellectuals and artists who were alienated by Communist rule. As a policy response, he declared a new policy of intellectual freedom.

 

Mao declared, “The policy of letting a hundred flowers bloom and a hundred schools of thought contend is designed to promote the flourishing of the arts and the progress of science.”

 

This declaration is referred to as the “Hundred Flowers Campaign” (often misquoted as the “thousand flowers campaign”). The response to Mao’s invitation was an enthusiastic outpouring of creative thought and artistic expression.

 

What came next was no surprise to those familiar with the operation of state power. Once the intellectuals and artists emerged, it was easy for Mao’s secret police to round them up, kill and torture some, and send others to “reeducation camps” where they learned ideological conformity.

 

The Hundred Flowers Movement was a trap for those who placed their trust in the state.

 

It was also a taste of things to come in the form of the much more violent and comprehensive Cultural Revolution of 1964–1974 in which all traces of Chinese bourgeoisie culture and much of China’s historical legacy were eradicated.

 

Something similar is going on with Bitcoin and the Distributed ledger technology (DLT) today. Governments have been patiently watching blockchain technology develop and grow outside their control for the past eight years.

 

Libertarian supporters of blockchain celebrate this lack of government control. Yet, their celebration is premature, and their belief in the sustainability of powerful systems outside government control is naïve.

 

Governments don’t like competition especially when it comes to money. Governments know they cannot stop blockchain, in fact they don’t want to. What they want is to control it using powers of regulation, taxation, and investigation and ultimately more coercive powers including arrest and imprisonment of individuals who refuse to obey government mandates with regard to blockchain.

 

Blockchain does not exist in the ether (despite the name of one cryptocurrency) and it does not reside on Mars. Blockchain depends on critical infrastructure including servers, telecommunications networks, the banking system, and the power grid, all of which are subject to government control.

 

A group of major companies, all regulated by government, have announced a joint effort to develop an open-source blockchain as a uniform standard for all blockchain applications. The group includes JPMorgan, Wells Fargo, State Street, SWIFT, Cisco, Accenture, the London Stock Exchange and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial. That’s not exactly five guys in hoodies working in a garage. That’s a sign of the corporate-state consortium taking over.

 

An elite U.S. legal institution called the Uniform Law Commission, that proposes model laws intended for adoption in all fifty states, has released its latest proposal called the “Uniform Regulation of Virtual Currency Businesses Act.”

 

This new law will not only provide a regulatory scheme for state regulators, but will also be a platform for litigation by private plaintiffs and class action lawyers seeking recourse against real or imagined abuses by digital coin exchanges and facilities. Once litigation begins, anonymity is the first casualty.

 

CRYPTOCURRENCIES AND THE SUPER-ELITES PLAN

 

Consider the following additional developments:

 

On August 1, 2017, the SEC announced “Guidance on Regulation of Initial Coin Offerings,” the first step toward requiring fundraising through blockchain-based tokens to register with the government.

 

On August 1, 2017, the World Economic Forum, host body to the Davos conference of global super-elites, published a paper entitled “Four reasons to question the hype around blockchain.”

 

On August 7, 2017, China announced they will begin using blockchain to collect taxes and issue “electronic invoices” to citizens there.

Perhaps most portentously, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has weighed in. In a special report dated June 2017, the IMF had this to say about blockchain:

 

“Distributed ledger technology (DLT), in particular, could spur change in the financial sector. …. DLT can be categorized as “permissionless” or “permissioned” depending on who can participate in the consensus-driven validation process. Permissionless DLTs allow anyone to read, transact on, and participate in the validation process. These open schemes (that underlie Bitcoin, for instance) could be very disruptive if successfully implemented. By contrast, in permissioned DLTs, the validation process is controlled by a pre-selected group of participants (“consortium”) or managed by one organization (“fully-private”), and thus serve more as a common communications platform.” (emphasis added).

IMF releases require expert translation because they are never written in plain English, and the real meaning is always hidden between the lines. But, the thrust of this report language is clear. The IMF favors “permissioned” systems over “open schemes.” The IMF also favors control by a “pre-selected group of participants” or “one organization,” rather than allowing “anyone” to participate.

 

This paper should be viewed as the first step in the IMF’s plan to migrate its existing form of world money, the special drawing right or SDR, onto a DLT platform controlled by the IMF. In time, all other forms of money would be banned.

 

These and other developments all point toward an elite group including the IMF, JPMorgan, the Davos crowd, the IRS, SEC, and other agencies converging to shut down the existing free-wheeling blockchain ecosphere, and replace it with a “permissioned” system under “consortium” control.

 

Big Brother is coming to the blockchain.

 

https://dailyreckoning.com/global-elites-secret-cryptocurrencies/

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I recently added Poloniex accounts.

 

Reviews are mixed. Ppl who know the business are pretty positive on them. ... it’s the noobs who seem to get jacked around.

 

Sadly, I wouldn’t trust any of the 'exchanges' any further than I could throw them... and I could throw them less far now than I used to could.

 

Thoughts? Experiences? Thx.

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Why are cry exchanges structured the way they are?

 

thx

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Any thoughts on the etherium concepts?

thx

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corrections not withstanding, here's some bull

 

Why Will Bitcoin Succeed? How About Saving $140 billion in Bank Fees? | Ross Pilot | Safehaven.com

 

ish thoughts on btc

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what gap? {you can actually put technical studies on a BTC Chart??? }

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someone thinks

https://monetary-metals.com/bitcoin-precise-not-accurate-gold-silver-report-17-sep-2017/

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https://cryptoinsider.com/is-bitcoin-reaching-a-critical-mass-hyperbitcoinization/

 

So why do I still suspect the blockchain is a trap?

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juicy

 

It is quite hilarious to watch the posturing of central banks and their media mouthpieces on the subject of cryptocurrencies. A recent Reuters article on the subject provided numerous moments of mirth. The title alone is good for a chuckle.

 

Too Soon to Determine Risks of Central Bank-Issued Cryptocurrencies: BIS

 

It’s always amusing when these shameless con-men (and women) attempt to portray themselves as sober arbiters of risk. Those who understand our monetary system are aware that the funny-money that these shysters are currently peddling is completely worthless.

...

 

Since 2009 and the era of unlimited dollar-supply began, the U.S. dollar (and all its fiat currency derivatives) has been completely worthless. It is with this backdrop that we watch these Clown Princes of our monetary system debating the “risks” involved with crytpocurrencies.

 

...

 

What gives a gold-backed currency value? It is backed by a hard asset with a 5,000 year pedigree.

 

What gives a fiat currency value? Our (honest and trustworthy) governments say that that this funny-money has value.

 

What gives a cryptocurrency value? An algorithm.

 

The vast majority of our populations have no clear understanding of what an algorithm is. That’s how and why the banksters have gotten away with imposing their totally fraudulent trading algorithms on our markets – no one understands the obvious criminality of allowing computers to hijack our markets.

 

So it comes down to a choice. Are the masses more likely to retain faith in our funny-money knowing that it is “backed” by an algorithm, or “backed” by the good word of our governments? Framed in those terms, the choice seems obvious: fiat currencies out; cryptocurrencies in.

 

A recent article distinguished cryptocurrencies from real money: gold and silver or precious metals-backed money.

 

…mere currencies (such as all of our

paper currencies) are not “money”. They are not a store of value. They are not rare or precious. They have no intrinsic value. Their utility is purely as a medium of exchange.

 

Crypto-currencies, as the name directly implies, are not money. They are not a store of value. They are mere currency.

 

They can still be distinguished from our fraudulent (central bank-created) fiat currencies. As was previously discussed, many credible sources will attest to the fact that crypto-currencies are not fraudulent.

 

Here is the appeal. Cryptocurrencies are not money, meaning they are not a store of value, thus they will not intrinsically help the masses preserve their wealth. At the same time, unlike the central bank’s fiat currencies, cryptocurrencies are not open frauds that are rapidly losing any veneer of legitimacy.

 

Cryptocurrencies are becoming more legitimate in the eyes of the masses, eyes which (more and more often) are coloured by greed. See how high Bitcoin soared last week/month/year?

 

For 45 years, all we have seen is the purchasing power of our (so-called) money plummeting. The same chocolate bar that cost a dime when the gold standard was killed costs a dollar today. Now the masses are actually catching a glimpse of currencies that rise in purchasing power, even as the supply increases.

 

Something for nothing.

 

Of course, in the real world there is “no free lunch”. Understand that the value of a cryptocurrency cannot increase as the supply increases simultaneously. That is nothing more than the same lie that the central bankers currently peddle regarding the U.S. dollar.

 

The price of a cryptocurrency can go up (temporarily), but only for so long as holders are willing to bid up that price. As soon as the tide goes out, a cryptocurrency has identical value to a fiat currency: zero. Framed in those terms, it’s no wonder that our monetary con-men are expressing more and more public interest in cryptocurrencies.

 

Central bank flirtations with cryptocurrencies may be viewed by some as the green light to pile into this new form of currency. Think again. There is a 100% opposite way in which this scenario could play out.

 

It goes like this. Central banks continue their “risk assessment” of cryptocurrencies as the price of these virtual currencies spirals higher. But before the central banks embrace cryptocurrencies officially, the bottom falls out and these currencies plummet to near-worthlessness.

 

Sound implausible? Whose money has fueled the spike in value of these cryptocurrencies to date? Very probably it is the dirty money of the banking crime syndicate.

 

The motivation should be obvious to astute readers. Cryptocurrencies represent competition for the official (but fraudulent) fiat currencies produced by central banks. The oligarchs who control this crime syndicate despise despite competition in any form – and even more so with respect to their money-printing monopoly.

 

What is the modus operandi of these oligarchs when it comes to anything which seeks to compete with their criminal empire? Control it. Or destroy it. Or control it then destroy it.

 

As regular readers already know, the banking crime syndicate has the capacity to legally counterfeit infinite quantities of its fiat currency funny-money. Surely this crime syndicate would not be sloppy enough to simply watch these cryptocurrencies emerge as direct competition?

 

Throw some of their spare change into Bitcoin et al and they take control of the competition. At that point they are free to promote their success, or to destroy these cryptocurrencies by suddenly and dramatically pulling out all their own dirty money.

 

...

 

 

https://www.sprottmoney.com/Blog/central-bank-cryptocurrencies-just-a-different-kind-of-funny-money-jeff-nielson.html

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Breaking TL news

 

Mitsubishi now has his own blockchain cryptocurrency.

It’s called the MUFG coin

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ico's

What the Media Isn?t Telling You About Initial Coin Offerings | Ross Pilot | Safehaven.com

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https://www.theinstitutionalriskanalyst.com/single-post/2017/10/29/Bitcoin-Blockchain-and-Bank-America

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CME futures on BTC can be seen as form of ‘regulation’

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Of Two Minds - How Will Bitcoin React in a Financial Crisis Like 2008?

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Anyone else playing the arb spread between Bitcoin cash and Bitcoin futures ?

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CME futures on BTC can be seen as form of ‘regulation’

 

...

 

When observed through the Mandelbrot lens, the idea of the CME using the same limits for price movement of bitcoin futures as those it uses for those of the S&P 500 seems ridiculous. In popular culture, the definition of insanity "is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results." Try to put a tiger into the same cage one uses for a housecat and see what happens

.

The Bitcoin Hard Fork?A Tiger by the Tail | Zero Hedge

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what is hashgraph? [is it faster? more better? less costly to 'produce?]

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Charting the Rise and Fall of some famous asset bobbles

http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/images/user3303/imageroot/2017/11/21/20171122_bit.png

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Chainalysis estimates 17% to 23% of existing bitcoins are lost.

 

I bring this up bcse I have a friend who for 'security' stores his btc split up. He thinks if he stores each 'half' redundantly he's safe... I keep trying to tell him he could easily lose access to all the copies of one 'side' of his split and if he does all his btc are belong to nobody

Edited November 27, 2017 by zdo

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$20,000 USD

 

( I only set price ‘targets’ because I’m so right so often :rofl: )

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Blockchain and the Bear: Why Russia has fallen for fintech | Crypto Insider . | Safehaven.com

 

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/ywnmkk/coinbase-irs-14000-bitcoin-tax

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?: Could BTC stand up to a quantum attack?

 

more importantly

 

?: Could an exchange (or all of the exchanges) stand up to a quantum attack?