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Comment by paulmd | Hacker News Reader

There is little reason to prefer Bitcoin to US Dollars or Euros for those looking to avoid the effects of inflation. There is nothing uniquely difficult about getting hard currencies on the black market in such places, it's simply that most people cannot afford it - and will not be able to afford Bitcoin either. It's a dumb suggestion from breathless fanboys who didn't really think about the actual problem before pushing their solution.

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You can't confiscate a brain wallet

This $5 wrench says otherwise.

https://xkcd.com/538/

Torture only works if you are sure of the existence of such a thing. It's easy to order the police to go from home to home, confiscating valuables. It's a lot harder to know if someone has bitcoin, and if so how much they have. Even if you can get them to admit they have it, and give you access to n wallets, they may always have n+1

You don' need evidence, just hit them with a wrench until bitcoins come out or they stop moving.

> Torture only works if you are sure of the existence of such a thing.

I don't think you comprehend the workings of "mass terror". Here's how it goes: we'll make you watch while we beat up your wife and kids until you tell us something worth knowing.

No evidence necessary. Pretty much everybody has some valuables, or knows someone who does, and if not who cares? It's your funeral.

Once again, the nerdy preconception that thugs somehow operate on a legalistic or technical basis is just completely wrong. You'll be the one "giving" the valuables to them, to make it stop.

doesn't scale to all citizens of Zimbabwe :)

Surely when these hypothetical thugs are going around beating people up and confiscating their paper money, they can spare a few moments to beat people up and take their Bitcoin while they're at it?

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