Comment by firekvz | Hacker News Reader

Comment by firekvz | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

They traced him, because, it seems that he wasn't the smartest criminal in the planet.

Just the fact that he was in tokyo (japan), instead of a non US aligned country, such as Russia or China, that he had his private keys easy accesible and that he stayed in BTC instead of going for another crypto more anon friendly, says a lot of the stupid nature of this "criminal"

But once again, my whole point is, coinbase allowed a random person to deposit 154 millions USD and withdraw 3.8k btc with absolutely no problems? and in a quickly way, according to the original article

I think its safe to assume that the banks said, okay the money went to coinbase, and coinbase just said yeah about that, he used the money to buy BTC and withdrew it to this wallet and thats about it

the guy was located cause he didnt even try to hide himself, the rest is history.

my point remains, if this, that was a such dumb crime, managed to convert the stolen funds into BTC using coinbase with absolutely no problems, then its easy to assume that real and strong money going to biggest offshores exchanges is from illicit sources.

Why are you holding Coinbase responsible but not the bank?

Im not holding anyone responsible, im just mentioning that, it's obvious that a lot of the money flowing into crypto its not legal, this sets a clear example of how easy stolen money was washed using coinbase without much problems, its a clear indicator for the big picture, when exchanges like binance has 10x more volume, where do u think that money is really comming from? and that is actually happening on those exchanges with money flowing?

You're making a point about how it was so easy for the perp to get money into crypto while seemingly ignoring the fact that it was equally easy for him to move the money around via the traditional banking system.

Must has been a really shitty bank. And they do exist for sure. Lot of people were at fault here. I know if it were my bank, I would be getting a call from them asking them if something is up. "Hey, just wanted to make sure, you are actually authorizing all this cash right?"

Did it ever hit you that all the illegal money flowing into crypto IS ILLEGAL PRIOR TO BEING IN CRYPTO?

Exactly. This is probably the best outcome for the owner of the money. I remember reading a story about how the government recovered supposedly millions of dollars worth of diamonds but was unable to unload those diamonds for anywhere the amount the criminal bought it for. I would have thought the government would force the people who sold the diamonds to take it back and reimburse the government in full.

I don't get why that was not an option.

Weird deflection.

> Just the fact that he was in tokyo (japan), instead of a non US aligned country, such as Russia or China,

Coinbase does not serve PRC citizens or Russians (see https://www.coinbase.com/places). Exactly so that any money laundering can be caught by US government.

What should have coinbase done? $150m is not a biggest of sums they handle daily for random persons. All you have to have is a bank account and a succesful deposit. Why should coinbase even care, if all regulatory rules were fulfilled?

"Why should I care that I am helping criminals steal money" is a pretty damn shitty attitude to have.

Why should I care that some people I am helping are sometimes criminals, maybe

Don’t put words in a mouth that never said it.

And as a person (citizen), yes. As a business, one doesn’t care if bread or guns they make help potential criminals to live or murder. If you don’t ask your customers if they are “bad guys who have all the paperwork but still stolen this money” at the doorstep, don’t blame others. Regulations are there for you to not trouble your head about it, just follow them.

> As a business, one doesn’t care if bread or guns they make help potential criminals to live or murder.

Why are you stating this as if it an unquestionable fact? It sure as hell isn't.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com