2mo ago

U.S. Government Removes Tornado Cash Sanctions

www.coindesk.com

40 comments

This seems to be all about a technicality involving how these sanctions are applied. Sanctions are meant to be applied to people and the companies they run, and a US court ruled that these sanctions couldn't be applied to a smart contract because it's just a bunch of code, and not the property of a sanctioned individual. This ruling was made back in November, they are just getting around now to removing the sanctions. From what I can tell, the sanctions against the people involved in running the service are still in effect.

Good, mixers are legitimate privacy tools
- Do you have any evidence to back this up?
  It's reasonable to assume that the vast majority of their throughput is used for crime.
  The overwhelming majority of people do not leverage crypto in any way. Even crypto scam promoters almost exclusively focus on speculation and do not use crypto as money.
  And you do not need the payment for your order of bell peppers and toilet paper to be private. Let's be real here.
  Over the 15+ years that we've had crypto, there have been only two viable uses. All others have failed:
  Criminal activity (including brutal stuff like enabling NK/Russia and drug cartels)
  Financial speculation (in of itself often a malicious activity where the goal is to dump your worthless bags on a mark)
  
  Over the 15+ years that we’ve had crypto, there have been only two viable uses. All others have failed:
  
  Criminal activity (including brutal stuff like enabling NK/Russia and drug cartels) Financial speculation (in of itself often a malicious activity where the goal is to dump your worthless bags on a mark)
  Huh, Weird... Every use I've ever used crypto for doesn't fall into these two categories. So I guess your assumptions and thus everything you based your logic/responses on must be faulty and incorrect.
  I use Crypto much like I use my second language/citizenship. Rarely... However, that doesn't mean I don't use it legally. And simply holding onto the crypto != financial speculation. Nobody treats a savings account as "financial speculation".
  I've paid for plenty of things from my crypto wallets. Ranging from several to thousands of dollars.
  And yes, I would like my payment for toilet paper and bell peppers to be private. Strictly for the fact that I don't want Mega-corpo stores to be able to track and advertise to me based on my payment method. "Club cards" to advertise/track you are a thing. Large chains can do this same thing with payment methods details. So yes, being "real" here, I not only require it, but demand it.
  Your premise is bad. And based on your other responses you don't care to address it at all.
  
  And you do not need the payment for your order of bell peppers and toilet paper to be private.
  Yes I do.
  Just because you don't value your privacy doesn't mean nobody does. It's none of the government's business what I buy, nor is it my bank's. They'll need to find another way to catch criminals than forcing me to be transparent about my transactions.
  
  I've used crypto for legitimate transactions in the past. It bailed me out once, big time, when I had to top up a foreign SIM card while abroad and their website wouldn't take my US credit card. I found a site selling top-up codes that took crypto and sent some from my phone, and I was back in business. (The site was legit, but even if it turned out to be a scam I knew they could never take anything more than what I sent them because of the way crypto worked.) But this was back when people were still using it to transact.
  The worst thing that ever happened to law-abiding people using crypto was when it's price zoomed up. Because for all those early adopters, every individual transaction now has a considerble capital gain attached. That's why people don't spend crypto anymore, because it's been turned by the market into a Store of Value. (And by developers, but that's a different thread).
  
  I have my own experience. Didn't want people I transacted with to know how much I had, so I had to use some kind of mixer eventually
  
  And you do not need the payment for your order of bell peppers and toilet paper to be private. Let's be real here.
  the zcash method really doesn't work. because then when you want to pay for something legitimate privately, that'll immediately be "suspicious" and you know who will be knocking on the door soon.
  I do want to pay for bell peppers and toilet paper privately and everyone deserves to be able to do so, for similar reasons why I want to keep my youtube watch history private, even from google, and why am I using a pseudonymous forum.
  that's why I almost exclusively use cash too. fuck the cashless society.

About damn time. This is a win for those of us who wish to use crypto as actual money and need privacy. Because not everybody should know the balance of your accounts. That's just stupid. This is why the majority of my dealings with crypto are in Monero.
- I'm really curious here: What are you buying and dealing with crypto? I am old and I remember the first discussions about Bitcoin and other cryptos and the privacy topic was discussed back then. People were skeptical of the technology, exactly because every transaction was public and people were even more skeptical after others started to use bitcoin to buy drugs with it online. So why are you using technology that is not really suited for privacy by design and expect privacy?
  
  Monero does provide privacy because while it is a public blockchain, the sender is obscured, the receiver is obscured, and the amount is obscured. The IP address of the node is obscured.
  To somebody not participating in the transaction, they basically see the equivalent of "? Sent ? Xmr to ?"
  
  you did not ask me, but here is another perspective. I'm paying for online services. like twitch, with gift cards. not it doesn't cost more. why don't I pay with a bank account? because I don't trust twitch and their payment provider with my data, like I refuse to add my phone number because that would make my account linkable with other things. I also don't really trust my bank about what do I pay for, and it's not like there are better banls out there.

40 comments