Cryptocurrency
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- utopian1
Crypto's 'Tornado Cash' fans money laundering fears, may be 'tip of the iceberg'
On January 17th, with cryptocurrency prices being widely routed by risk aversion, Crypto.com flagged a "security incident" that caused the operation to freeze withdrawals.
Days later, the Singapore-based exchange announced that hackers had stolen at least $15 million worth of Ethereum (ETH) tokens — and potentially as much as $33 million, according to independent estimates — but pledged to reimburse those affected. Crypto.com faulted some accounts for a lack of 2-factor authentication for the breach, but didn't provide many other details.
However, information security specialists and amateur blockchain sleuths on Twitter were already tracing the hacked funds, with almost half pointing to a non-custodial Decentralized Finance (DeFi) mixing service called Tornado Cash. That's where the trail goes cold.
Tornado Cash (TORN), itself a smart contract token, is one of a few legal cryptocurrency mixing (or "tumbling") protocols that can be used to obfuscate transaction history.
It can also wash crypto proceeds in ways that are raising alarm among investors and law enforcement — already grappling with a rise in the sector's illicit activity amid a sharpening debate over how to provide regulatory oversight to the booming digital coin movement.
Experts say blockchain mixing services aren't necessarily illicit, even though hackers use them. While part of the growing crypto ecosystem, mixers offer a handy way for criminals to launder funds without being explicitly classified as money laundering.
Still, in December, hackers used Tornado Cash to wash $196 million of crypto stolen from Bitmart, a crypto exchange. According to Victor Fang, CEO and Founder of blockchain analytics firm Anchain.AI, Tornado Cash uses zero knowledge proof.
"This is advanced cryptography, Turing-awarded work from MIT, the highest award in computer science" explained Fang, who chuckled in awe of the technology underpinning the protocol.
Over the past year, Tornado Cash serviced over $10 billion worth of crypto transaction according to Anchain, with a rising number of criminal cases being managed by Fang's firm involving the protocol.
- neverscared3
Ilya Lichtenstein, a tech entrepreneur and Y combinator alum.
Heather Morgan, a Forbes columnist.
Today they were arrested for trying to launder billions in stolen crypto. They face up to 20 years in prison
- lol @ her bio... also - biggest heist in American history... something to be proud of!!PonyBoy
- https://twitter.com/…neverscared
- 4.5 billionneverscared
- Where the fun iszaq
- https://www.justice.…neverscared
- They used a complex scheme to obscure the source of the funds — including buying #NFTs. This is the first ML arrest involving NFTs!neverscared
- shapesalad1
- no shit sherlock... crytpo is global...who would have thought something decentral can be global.... mind officialy blown.neverscared
- Top 10 countries for bitcoin mining activity
1) Kazakhstan
2) Russia
3) Ireland*
4) Germany*
5) Sweden
6) Norway
7) Iceland
8) UK
9) France
10) Georgianeverscared - *Evidence of activity probably inflated owing to redirected IP addresses via the use of VPN or proxy services.neverscared
- You forgot the biggest: US
https://www.statista…grafician - did i ? https://www.theguard…neverscared
- read that Chyna still has a lot of mining but using VPNs like they mention in the article, BUT the US still is the biggest mining country by output/hashrategrafician
- neverscared-3
- Fuck me, every hour has to be filled with stuff. Got to do more. Got to learn how to make more money. Got to make sense of the world. Slow the fuck down HeatherIanbolton
- Lol. Her bio includes, rapping and designing street-wearGnash
- what's it got to do with crypto?shapesalad
- She and her husband were caught with the stolen Bitfinex BTC on a hard drive. The US government is alleging the planned to launder it.jonny_quest_lives
- And that's what it had to do with crypto. ~~~The More You Know ☆jonny_quest_lives
- https://twitter.com/…neverscared
- makeup artists hate herkingsteven
- rappers hate hergrafician
- jonny_quest_lives0
"New York hipster couple charged in billion-dollar bitcoin heist were ‘serial entrepreneurs’ who used startups to launder money, prosecutors say"
https://www.marketwatch.com/stor…
"In her LinkedIn profile, Morgan described herself as a serial entrepreneur originally from California, and an “irreverent comedic rapper,” who performed under the name Razzlekhan, “the infamous crocodile of Wall Street.” She is also a writer who has contributed articles to Inc. and Forbes. She listed being able to speak eight languages on her LinkedIn page, including Arabic, Cantonese, Korean and Furbish, the made-up language spoken by the popular, hamster-like toy, the Furby."
- They will be making memes from her tiktoks for months...jonny_quest_lives
- Didn't she like "confessed" in one of ther tiktoks?
Crypto people are idiots...grafician - Anyway, a more details around here:
https://twitter.com/…grafician
- Krassy0
how is cryptocurrency trading not gambling? serious question.
- how are stocks and fiat not gambling? how is falling in love or simply going outside not gambling?Milan
- stocks depend on company performance; fiat currency is not being traded reallyKrassy
- Stocks don't depend on company performance.zarkonite
- sure they do: "Fundamental factors drive stock prices based on a company's earnings and profitability from producing and selling goods and services."Krassy
- https://www.investop…Krassy
- err, forex? gambling is a vague enough term it could mean "buying with expectation of an increase in value" so buying anything could be gamblingkingsteven
- i'd say thats true of almost all cryptocurrency. i only have EWT now and i'd consider that an investment (just not a particularly smart one atm)kingsteven
- will be a huge problem https://www.theguard…neverscared
- oops https://www.theguard…neverscared
- starting a business is a gamble, maybe 50% gamble, stock trading is 65%, crypto is 70%, sports betting 90%, roulette is 99%. more or lessBeeswax
- @neverscared exactly. good oneKrassy
- is there some empiric data on that numbers from beeswax or is this fantasyland number dropping.neverscared
- stock performance is based on buying and selling activity, which MAY or MAY NOT be based on company performancemonospaced
- buying and selling = supply and demand = company performance as it is closely tied to supplying to meet demand.Krassy
- is keeping your money in fiat gambling? or just stupidity?inteliboy
- Supply demand isn’t company performance though.monospaced
- company performance is absolutely tied to supply & demand, c'mon now :)Krassy
- Nairn-1
How do you know if someone is v̶e̶g̶a̶n̶ pro-Crypto?
Oh, don't worry, they'll fuckin' try and sell it to you.- they'll also have green/blue/pink hair.shapesalad
- LolAQUTE
- neverscared1
The Rabbit Hole Beneath the Crypto Couple Is Endless
Heather Morgan and Ilya Lichtenstein wanted to be famous. Now, after being accused of laundering billions of dollars of crypto, they are.- T T T Twerkin till I die!GuyFawkes
- twerking in prisonneverscared
- palimpsest2
- Feels like a desperate scam at this point, not a thriving new business.formed
- FTX website is so bad though, the trading etc. just ugly.shapesalad
- Thing is... I want to be like Larry, getting paid a shit tonne to appear in a crypto commercial.shapesalad
- drgs1
- Breaking: Billionaire who loves banks hates tech that makes banks obsolete. Shocker.DRIFTMONKEY
- More like "listen to your elders"grafician
- “Crypto is not like children. You can’t cook them up and eat them”
https://twitter.com/…Milan - hedge fund billionaire says 'ppl wanna get rich off crypto without contributing to society' - give me a fucking break lolBuddhaHat
- /\ https://pbs.twimg.co…Milan
- Thank goodness all these hedge funds are working on our behalf.DRIFTMONKEY
- Munger also said the value of the dollar is likely going to zero and inflation is going to collapse society. Ask that man to open a PDF. I dare you.FNP14
- neverscared0
#decentralisation #whales #oligarchy
Libertarianism For Me, But Not For Thee
Cryptocurrency has perfected crony-capitalism and sold it to the desperate.The transaction appears to have been done by a bot, which can be coded to immediately buy NFTs listed below a certain price on behalf of their owners in order to take advantage of these exact situations.
- PhanLo-2
- utopian-1
Scammers Stole $14 Billion in Crypto in 2021
Cryptocurrency crime had a record-breaking year in 2021, with a new report finding scammers took $14 billion worth of crypto last year.
That’s nearly twice the $7.8 billion taken by scammers in 2020, according to blockchain data firm Chainalysis’ “2022 Crypto Crime Report,” findings from which were released Thursday, Jan. 6.
- neverscared1
North Korean cyber-attacks have stolen millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency to fund the country's missile programmes, a UN report briefed to media says.
Between 2020 and mid-2021 cyber-attackers stole more than $50m (£37m) of digital assets, investigators found.
Such attacks are an "important revenue source" for Pyongyang's nuclear and ballistic missile programme, they said.
The findings were reportedly handed to the UN's sanctions committee on Friday.
- Average Joe wanting to get some crypto to buy a jpeg, getting hacked and accidentally financing underground ballistic missile programs...grafician
- Small price to pay for supporting pioneering artists to forge a new frontier in creativityGnash
- nuked apesneverscared
- neverscared1
we has the criminal hackers...
Exclusive: Austrian Programmer And Ex Crypto CEO Likely Stole $11 Billion Of Ether
Who hacked The DAO in 2016, diverting 3.6 million ether? We identify the apparent hacker — he denies it — by following a complicated trail of crypto transactions and using a previously undisclosed privacy-cracking forensics tool.
- drgs0
https://www.btc-echo.de/news/bit…
https://www-btc--echo-de.transla…In its MiCA guidelines, the European Parliament wants to ban the provision of crypto services based on “environmentally unsustainable consensus mechanisms”. This emerges from a final compromise proposal by the responsible Committee for Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON), which is available to BTC-ECHO. De facto, this could mean the end for proof-of-work based cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin from January 1, 2025 in the European Union. A final decision on the draft is to be made in parliament on February 28.
- about timekingsteven
- Not going to happenshapesalad
- It's only ban on proof of work mining, not usage of Bitcoin. They can't ban mining in countries outside of EU (not much mining in EU anyway)drgs
- But it adds to the existing anti-crypto trend which is not gooddrgs
- i remember energy web had a solution where PoW transactions can be accompanied by a carbon cert on their network, you can then build exchanges thatkingsteven
- only trade carbon free btc. (it wouldn't matter where it was mined, they have already have agreements with energy companies globally)kingsteven
- I assume existing BTC (19 mill) are all without carbon cert? There is only 2 mill left to mine.drgs
- mining is also the process for confirming transactions, it will continue once all BTC is brought in to circulation. there would need to be a fork in BTC orkingsteven
- exchanges would need to support an additional blockchain to monitor power usage and issue energy attribute certificates based on an additionalkingsteven
- appliance... i watched an interview with energy web's CEO back when the mining consortium was founded where some solutions were hinted atkingsteven
- it's obviously much easier with PoS but energy web did a similar thing with XRP shortly after.kingsteven
- sorry i meant 'crypto climate accord' not 'mining consortium' that BS musk was involved in for a minutekingsteven
