How a Bitcoin Evangelist Made Himself Vanish, in 15 Not So Easy Steps
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Will this protect him against a slightly funded and half motivated actor? Probably not.
“Announcing Jameson Lopp as a speaker at Baltic Honeybadger 2019 Bitcoin conference #bh2019, (link: https://bh2019.hodlhodl.com) bh2019.hodlhodl.com”
https://twitter.com/hodlhodl/status/1099286199783481350
Unless he is making a virtual appearance, just follow him or grab him there.
EDIT: I should make it clear I’m not just referencing the article but also the twitter conversations I’ve seen from th author (swatting is a good reason to take some of these steps obviously). For example, https://twitter.com/lopp/status/920669889064570880. He even comments himself in that thread “Local PD isn't going to send out the SWAT team again without calling me first”
Going to a physical location and kidnapping is something far above the event that motivated the change.
There is a large contingent of online craptivists who won't be bright enough or motivated enough to get to him, and the ones who are bright enough and motivated enough will probably be more interested in other people.
just follow him or grab him there
At least he's crossed the threshold of people having to do that.
"I don't need to outrun the bear. I just need to outrun you."
Then at least he could still stay in touch with his friends and family, and so many people wouldn't be so motivated to extract their revenge on him.
But no, running his illegal get-rich-quick pyramid scheme and fooling and exploiting other people was more important to him than his own and his dog's safety.
If he wasn't just doing this for cosplay and attention, and was actually concerned about his privacy, then maybe he shouldn't have contacted the New York Times and had them write an article about him, huh?
And you also claim he is a criminal who profited from an “illegal pyramid scheme”? Does this apply to anyone who has sold Bitcoin for more than they bought it for?
He hired a PI to test the work. Presumably that defeats this viewpoint? Not saying it protects him from the FBI, but I'd say if a PI can't find you then anyone who does want to is going to need to be more than slightly motivated to do so.
I don't understand: whose name appears on all the corporate vehicles driving around? A security van for Google, and Amazon delivery truck, a Brinks van: I'm supposed to think there's some employee's name on the title? What if that employee leaves?
An out-of-state license plate could attract unwanted attention though, which may be why Lopp chose not to employ this technique.
... Of course, IMEI tracking (from tower registration) can get you pretty much all of this data anyway. This article is more about how to partially obfuscate your identity to private actors.
It would be interesting to know how fast a professional could unravel all of this. Minutes? Hours?
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-29/seems-you...
So maybe, like parent said, track him at an in-person conference appearance?
Sure, individuals in law enforcement or the phone companies can be suborned (i.e. bribed) but all the procedures procedures described in the article are part of "defense in depth". And in fact some of the others make it harder to even know which IMEI to track. I don't know the IMEIs of the handsets of any of my friends -- or even my own, though I could look it up.
This is not that hard and there are private web forums where cellco reps surreptitiously offer their services for money/bitcoin/
"The traditional banking model achieves a level of privacy by limiting access to information to the parties involved and the trusted third party. The necessity to announce all transactions publicly precludes this method, but privacy can still be maintained by breaking the flow of information in another place: by keeping public keys anonymous. The public can see that someone is sending an amount to someone else, but without information linking the transaction to anyone."
That Bitcoin wasn't private was clear since day 0.
I do remember when I was briefly the director of a tiny UK non-profit that the company identity information was mandatory .. except for a very small list of those who were exempt because of intimidation, after a nasty terrorist campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/restricting-the-d...
"How a Very Wealthy Person Conceals His Name and Address From The Public"
> When he found a property to buy, he used the L.L.C. and a cashier’s check from the L.L.C.’s bank account to pay for the house in full. A mortgage was not going to be possible.
> 9. Buy a boring car.
> 10. Buy a decoy house to fool the D.M.V.
People living in NC and TX generally have a lot more disposable income than people in CA at the same gross income level. (In that sense, those other places are more free.)
pay for the house in full. A mortgage was not going to be possible.
It's entirely possible for an LLC to lease property. I also know for a fact that there are people in Chinatown who, for a variety of reasons, can't get a mortgage, but they can get alternative financing to the tune of several hundreds of thousands of dollars.
> 9. Buy a boring car.
Very affordable. I just did this.
> 10. Buy a decoy house to fool the D.M.V.
In the Blues Brothers movie, I think one of the characters had Wrigley Field as their address. If you have friends at an organization like a church, you could use that address.
The subject of the article did it with money. There are other people who do some things like this through their connections.
Sure, it's just more difficult to get to the same gross income level in those places.
Read the article: section 13.
>> People living in NC and TX generally have a lot more disposable income than people in CA at the same gross income level. (In that sense, those other places are more free.)
> Sure, it's just more difficult to get to the same gross income level in those places.
I'm not sure how you would manage to read this comment thread and think my comment is about the person in the article specifically.
And of course, step 16 of your not-so-easy plan to vanish to avoid the consequences of your actions should not be contacting the New York Times and having them write an article about you.
That's a pretty limited reading of the article. Another lesson might be about the difficulty ordinary people have in staying private in modern society. I can think of many reasons why a person might desire (or need) the sort of privacy outlined in the article that don't have anything to do with "shilling bitcoin."
> And of course, step 16 of your not-so-easy plan to vanish to avoid the consequences of your actions should not be contacting the New York Times and having them write an article about you.
Sure. This whole thing appears to be little more than a publicity stunt.
I still think it is harder to earn $100k per year in a place like North Carolina than, say, California.
But with that said you can buy houses for $20k in lots of places in this country, which I suspect the average HN reader could probably swing.
It's not like they'll find a homicide tied to a CC and then be like, "oh, the CC is in the name of an ownerless corporation, I guess we're out of luck".
The owners are recorded when the LLCs are filed with the secretary of state, however these states are simply willing to keep the identities of the owners private, without publishing them as most other states do. As in most other states, you do need a Registered Agent, but you can delegate this to an attorney or company who serves to receive legal notices, correspondence, etc.
If there is any type of law enforcement investigation of the company, police would simply go to the secretary of state to determine the owners.
How hackable/social engineering proof are these state agencies? How likely is it that they are already compromised by people acting as resources for federal and non-governmental organizations?
In 2019, one should be most worried about throngs of people who have less income and delusions of grandeur who can organize their groupthink online.
https://www.thebalance.com/pros-and-cons-of-revocable-living...
I regret that I wasn't privy to his plans for keeping them apart at his funeral.
My guess is that after his death it'll all just come undone with a discovery of his master digital calendar. So many birthdays!
A probable solution to the funeral thing is that the trust is set up to execute three funerals. Who care's what's in the urn, but it could deliver parts of him to all the places.
> To register his car, the D.M.V. insisted on a real name — not an L.L.C. — and a street address.
As far as I can tell, the car belongs to the LLC, it's not in his name, but his real identity is a registered driver or some such to said car.
If he used one LLC for car, another for the house, the point is moot... but the article leads me to believe they are under the same LLC, hence the initial comment.
I suppose a better question to have asked would be if there was/is any benefit for the DMV associated car+house to be purchased with an LLC rather than outright?
EDIT: a word
If this sort of thing could be structured so that it could be delivered economically, there are a lot of YouTubers who would be a potential market for this sort of service. That level of security would be entirely appropriate for them and very valuable.
This certainly fits into the category of things that don't scale.
How is he doing that legitimately?
Seriously though, the toughest part about seeking anonymity is working against human nature and one's need for social validation.
Buys a house, in cash. Buys another "throwaway" house for his car, in cash. Buys car, in cash. And then claims: "Mr. Lopp estimates that his efforts to disappear have cost him about $30,000."
Yeah, right.
Not in all states. In Texas, you do not need auto insurance if you can prove you have the financial ability to pay what an insurance company would otherwise pay.