They either can not or will not shoot straight:
"The Lufthansa heist, as it was known, was billed as the biggest cash robbery in US history, and it played a starring role in the 1990 Martin Scorsese movie “Goodfellas.”
"7 plead not guilty in NYC mob crackdown" by Colleen Long | Associated Press July 10, 2013
NEW YORK — Nine reputed members of the Bonanno crime family were charged in an indictment unsealed Tuesday with what prosecutors called old-school mob activity: gambling, loan sharking, extortion, and drugs.
A two-year investigation dismantled one crew of the family, including a captain, two capos, a soldier, and several associates, two of whom were members of an International Brotherhood of Teamsters local union, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. said.
Vance said that prosecutors have done such a good job taking down the mob in the past that it may seem like they’re no longer a threat. ‘‘Many mistakenly believe that the mob has disappeared entirely except if you watch HBO,’’ he said, referring to ‘‘The Sopranos.’’ “But we know in fact this is not the case.’’
Amazing how organized crime has been glorified in the jew$media.
Manhattan prosecutors said the defendants, including the former president of Local 917, were accused of using their union positions to solicit members as clients for their criminal enterprises, including online gambling and drugs. They were also accused of gun possession....
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"Reputed Pa. crime boss acquitted" Associated Press, January 25, 2014
PHILADELPHIA — A reputed Philadelphia mob boss beat back a conviction for a second time Friday at his retrial in a gambling and racketeering case.
A jury acquitted 74-year-old Joseph ‘‘Uncle Joe’’ Ligambi of witness tampering, but deadlocked on three other charges. It is not clear if prosecutors will try him a third time….
Mob turncoats and other government witnesses painted Ligambi as the head of a fading La Cosa Nostra crime family in Philadelphia. The FBI has been investigating him for more than a decade, since he allegedly took over….
The Ligambi case largely involves the collection of small gambling debts and loans, and the operation of video poker machines at neighborhood bars.
Translation: it's a penny ante operation.
The retrial was a pared-down version of last year’s trial, when Ligambi’s reputed underboss, enforcer, and several associates were convicted….
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"Racketeering case dropped against reputed Philadelphia mob boss" by Maryclaire Dale | Associated Press, January 29, 2014
PHILADELPHIA — The reputed boss of the Philadelphia mob walked free Tuesday after beating two racketeering trials in a case the Justice Department began pursuing more than a decade ago….
‘‘It was a nonviolent case. They were not looking to put away bloodthirsty criminals,’’ defense lawyer Ed Jacobs said. ‘‘These were, at most, economic crimes, if they were crimes.’’
Too big to jail?
The indictment, described by one defense attorney as ‘‘mob lite,’’ detailed relatively small-scale loansharking and gambling operations, such as efforts to control illegal poker machines inside South Philadelphia bars and collect sports bets in the neighborhood. Defendants could be heard on tape complaining that the mob was broke, and that the spread of legal casinos had taken a toll in their enterprise….
Yeah, organized crime is legal now, either through lottery or casino.
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Some were not so lucky:
"With sobs, Bulger, Greig traded jailhouse love letters" by J.M. Lawrence | Globe Correspondent, January 10, 2014
James “Whitey” Bulger and Catherine Greig penned jailhouse love letters on a legal pad ferried between prisons by a defense attorney, who said he watched the former fugitives sob as they read each other’s words.
Speaking at a gathering of Massachusetts defense lawyers Wednesday, attorney J.W. Carney Jr. said Bulger believed prison officials would never allow him to send a letter to Greig, the former dental hygienist who abandoned her life and helped him hide out in Santa Monica, Calif., for 15 years before their capture in 2011.
Carney said he offered his legal pad to Bulger while he was awaiting trial so the gangster could write words of comfort to Greig. With approval from Greig’s attorney, Carney then visited her at a federal detention center in Rhode Island, where she read Bulger’s letter and sobbed.
She added her own love letter to the pad, which Carney said he did not read before showing it to Bulger, who also wept when he saw it.
“To me there is no regulation or law that should prevent people from expressing love,” Carney said….
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Distance is the only thing that could keep them apart.
Related: Jailed mobster wants personal items back
Bulger’s attorneys insulting our intelligence
Jail warden to review policies after Bulger wrote letters
Going to have to start searching the lawyers now.
Whitey Bulger is moved to federal prison in Tucson
How spiteful and mean!
"A judge denied Thursday a request by the widow of one of James “Whitey” Bulger’s victims for a bigger share of the $822,000 cash and other assets that were seized from the gangster and will be split evenly among families of all 19 people he was accused of killing. Theresa Bond, Elaine Barrett’s daughter from his first marriage, said she was upset by her stepmother’s effort to get more money than other victims. “Everybody suffered,” said Bond, who befriended relatives of other victims while attending the gangster’s trial last summer in Boston. “Don’t say my father deserves more because of his suffering. That is a slap in the face to all of the victims’ families, and that’s not how you act when you love and support each other.”
Now that the jury has had its say I eagerly look forward to the movie:
"Film explores crimes of Bulger, complicity of FBI; Documentary explores crimes and complicity" by Ty Burr | Globe Staff, January 20, 2014
PARK CITY, Utah — The devil came to Sundance over the weekend.
“Whitey,” a new movie by documentary filmmaker Joe Berlinger, had its world premiere at the storied film festival in the Wasatch Mountains, and for two hours and 10 minutes a sold-out audience was held repelled and spellbound by a cast of characters Massachusetts natives know all too well and by the murderous crime lord who united them: James “Whitey” Bulger.
The full title of the film is “Whitey: United States of America v. James J. Bulger.”
********************
While the movie aims for balance, its contentions are simple and twofold: that the full measure of the FBI’s complicity in Bulger’s reign of violence was not allowed to be brought out in court, and that history and US citizens will not be served until that happens….
Said Berlinger in a Q&A session after the film screened Saturday at the MARC, a cavernous converted racquet club: “I want to make it very clear: I’m not saying that everything that comes out of Bulger’s mouth or the position of the defense is the truth. But those are areas that should have been explored at the trial. The film doesn’t claim to know any more than the amazing work that a lot of great journalists have done for many years on this story. The film is just saying, ‘Hey, something smelly is going on here and it should have been more deeply probed.’ ”
But it won't be in this Globe piece, and the judge disallowed any reference to such things during trial.
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Related: ‘Whitey’ director wants more answers about FBI involvement"
So do I.
"Whitey movie eerie experience for ‘Black Mass’ coauthor" by Dick Lehr | Special to the Globe July 31, 2014
Whitey Bulger relaxes on Miami Beach on a sizzling hot day, sharing a lounge chair with his girlfriend, Catherine Greig, a gorgeous blonde in a bikini who cuddles like a cat between the crime boss’s legs. Nearby, Bulger’s partner, Stevie Flemmi, pulls on a cigarette. FBI agent John Connolly peels off twenties to pay for rum drinks as Boston businessman John Callahan, an executive with World Jai Alai, eagerly sips his. Bulger’s protege Kevin Weeks struts from the surf and joins them.
It’s the Whitey Bulger Gang, circa 1981, riding the wave of its unholy alliance with the deeply corrupted FBI. The notorious gangster is catching a break from the underworld grind, even as he mulls yet another murder, that of Callahan’s boss, the owner of World Jai Alai.
But this isn’t 1981. It’s July 11, 2014 — and it’s not Whitey Bulger, but Johnny Depp. Nor is that Catherine Greig, but Sienna Miller. John Connolly is Joel Edgerton, and so on. It’s also not Miami Beach, but our own Revere Beach, transformed magically with imported palm trees and popsicle-colored cabanas to resemble the Florida coast. This is Scene 91 in director Scott Cooper’s adaptation of “Black Mass: Whitey Bulger, the FBI and a Devil’s Deal,” a book Gerry O’Neill and I wrote that built off of years of reporting we and others did for The Boston Globe.
Since May 19, Cooper and his vast crew have been moving around the area, making a movie out of the murderous collusion between Whitey and the FBI....
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Related: Double-takes abound as Bulger movie films in Cambridge
How much tax loot is this costing citizens?
The sequel?
"‘Whitey’ Bulger appeals, calling conviction unfair" by Shelley Murphy | Globe staff August 14, 2014
Lawyers for James “Whitey” Bulger urged a federal appeals court Thursday to overturn the gangster’s conviction for participating in 11 murders, arguing that he did not get a fair trial because the judge refused to let him tell jurors that he had been promised immunity for all of his crimes decades ago.
That ruling “constitutionally deprived Mr. Bulger of his right to present an effective defense’’ and “stripped him of his right to testify about how he was able to avoid prosecution for almost twenty-five years,” Bulger’s lawyers wrote in a 201-page filing to the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit.
The lawyers, Hank Brennan and James Budreau, wrote that Bulger had little choice but to not take the stand during his trial last summer because US District Judge Denise Casper barred Bulger from telling jurors about his assertion that a now-deceased federal prosecutor had promised him immunity for all crimes, including murder.
“The court ruled that the defense could not raise the immunity defense at trial in any form, including the defendant’s own testimony at trial,” the lawyers wrote. “This error effected the fundamental fairness of Mr. Bulger’s trial and his convictions should be automatically reversed as a result.”
Prosecutors have 30 days to file a response, although they may seek an extension....
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Related: Bulger defense lawyers charge government $2.7m
As taxpayers it is the price we must pay.
"Mob associate Enrico Ponzo gets 28-year prison term" by Milton J. Valencia | Globe staff April 28, 2014
A gangster who attempted a hit on a notorious Mafia boss, then spent 16 years on the lam, posing for years as a cattle rancher in Idaho, was sentenced Monday to 28 years in prison, despite spirited pleas that he literally became a new man during his time on the run.
Enrico Ponzo, a New England Mafia associate from Boston, said he turned away from a career of crime and drugs, settling into a life as a cattle rancher named Jay Shaw and being “Mr. Mom” to his two children.
“If I was the Enrico Ponzo of 20 years ago, you never would have caught me; I would have escaped,” he told US District Court Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton before a packed courtroom in Boston.
Gorton expressed little sympathy, however, telling Ponzo, “After all the posturing, rhetoric, excuses, blaming others, the time has come for you to pay for your crimes.
“You can run, but ultimately you cannot hide from your sordid past in organized crime,” the judge said.
Ponzo, 45, known for his animations in the courtroom, stood solemnly, fumbling through paperwork and stopping to take a drink of water.
The theatrics of Monday’s sentencing hearing punctuated what had been a colorful, at times circuslike case since Ponzo was arrested in February 2011.
The arrest of a New England Mafia associate in Marsing, Idaho, a farming town of just over 1,000 people about 40 miles from Boise, made national headlines. Ponzo added drama to court hearings in the years since, getting animated during the proceedings, at times interrupting his court-
appointed lawyers. He was finally allowed to represent himself. His readiness to engage with prosecutors and the judge added to the theater.
It's all a show.
“I’m preserving my objections for the record,” he repeatedly told Gorton Monday, occasionally chuckling at prosecutors’ arguments.
He had dozens of objections to the way the judge calculated the sentence, even though he had faced a harsher sentence of 30 years to life under the guidelines.
Ponzo was an associate of a faction of the New England Mafia that was involved in a bloody power struggle in the late 1980s; a jury found him responsible for the attempted killing of two rivals, including former Mafia leader Francis P. “Cadillac Frank” Salemme, who was shot by masked men outside an International House of Pancakes in Saugus in 1989.
Ponzo was convicted of a racketeering conspiracy that included that shooting, as well as marijuana and cocaine dealing, money laundering, gun possession, and witness intimidation. He must forfeit $2,250,000 from his drug sale proceeds. Authorities plan to seize his Idaho home, as well as $100,000 in cash and $65,000 in gold coins they found at the time of his arrest.
Marilyn Diaz, who knew Ponzo as Jay Shaw in Idaho and wrote a letter on his behalf, said she was disappointed with the sentence.
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Related:
40-year term is sought for reputed mobster
Bulger backs a convict’s attempt for freedom
Fla. prosecutors ask court to reinstate Connolly conviction
Attorney wants John Connolly released
Someone who has been already:
"Film puts Internet icon, mission in new focus" by Ty Burr | Globe Staff, January 27, 2014
PARK CITY, Utah — In the wake of Aaron Swartz’s death, the wired world exploded in mourning and anger. He was not only the teen prodigy who had co-created the Web news feeder RSS and the essential Internet water-cooler site Reddit, he was known and loved by almost everyone who mattered at the intersections of technology, progressive activism, and Net freedom. The 2012 defeat of the Stop Online Piracy Act — a bill assumed to be headed for passage in the House of Representatives even by those who decried it as draconian — was sparked and spearheaded in no small part by Swartz’s efforts. He seemed headed for greater things, perhaps even public office. And then he was dead.
In the year since, Swartz has become a focal point for social and political change among a generation of young, wired progressives, their communal grief serving as an engine for recruitment and political change. Now he’s the subject of a documentary that stands to reach a wider audience, one that may be touched, outraged, and moved to action by the film’s portrait of an Internet butterfly crushed on the wheel of the US justice system.
The film arrived at Sundance seeking a theatrical distributor and left with lots of buzz but no bite as of yet. After the first festival screening on Jan. 20 — the teary sold-out audience peppered the director with questions: Why didn’t I know about this? What can we do to further Aaron’s mission? How can I get involved?
Impassioned, persuasive, and well made, “The Internet’s Own Boy” formalizes the narrative of Swartz as martyr, even as it provides a sweeping overview of his life and accomplishments. That overview ranges from adorable toddler videos to footage of technology conferences, where the 13-year-old held court with programmers four times his age, to his evolution into a thoughtful, earnest activist at the front lines of the battle for electronic democracy.
Brian Knappenberger, director of the new documentary “The Internet’s Own Boy: The Story of Aaron Swartz,” whose last film was 2012’s “We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists,” is a considered partisan.
“I think the best journalism has a point of view,” he said in an interview the afternoon following the premiere. “It tries to rigorously explore all the elements, including dissenting views — but it’s clear that I’m on one side of this argument.”
He’s holding forth in a crowded Main Street brew and burger joint a day after that first screening, surrounded by chic festivalgoers and grizzled Rocky Mountain locals. Across the table, emotionally spent, out of their element, and picking at french fries, sit Swartz’s father, Robert, and brothers Noah and Ben, all of whom accompanied the film to its Sundance premiere.
They and Swartz’s mother, Susan — who declined to make the trip from Highland Park, Ill., — are interviewed at length in “The Internet’s Own Boy,” speaking to Swartz’s life and legacy. (The family has no financial interest in the film, which was funded primarily through an online Kickstarter campaign.) Off-camera, they’re shyer but no less committed to carrying on his work, and they look at the film as a public memorial separate from their private loss….
Knappenberger did approach people at MIT, including Hal Abelson, a renowned professor, open source advocate, and author of a July 2013 report that absolved MIT of legal blame in the affair. Abelson declined to be interviewed for the film, as did others at the school….
The filmmaker approached the prosecutors as well, hoping to speak to assistant US attorney Stephen Heymann (who led the case against Swartz) or his boss, US Attorney Carmen Ortiz. “No statement, nothing,” says Knappenberger. “And there was substantial work that went into trying.”
***********************
Contacted by the Globe, a spokeswoman for the US attorney’s office had “no comment on the film or the case.”
By contrast, dozens of Swartz’s friends and colleagues lined up to commemorate him in the film, including Harvard professor and copyright activist Lawrence Lessig and other leading lights of the Internet and activist arenas. David Segal, a young politician and cofounder with Swartz of the group Demand Progress, saw his interview land on the cutting room floor, but his only concern was that his friend be portrayed as he was.
“I think Aaron would only be satisfied with a portrayal of Aaron of himself that was actually accurate,” Segal said. “He wouldn’t want anything that was falsely adulatory.”
“The Internet’s Own Boy” is glowing enough as it tries to convey what Aaron Swartz did in his life and what he means to the near future and beyond. But is it true to who Swartz was as a person?
--more--"
Related: Speaking Up For Swartz
Also see: Stars share thoughts on Sundance, staying warm
Think I'll skip the final feature then.
Back to the real criminals:
"Target says hackers stole credentials from vendor" by The Associated Press / AP / January 29, 2014
Target said Wednesday that investigators have found that hackers stole credentials from a vendor to access the retailer’s systems and pilfer about 40 million debit and credit card numbers as well as personal information for another 70 million people.
Spokeswoman Molly Snyder declined to comment on further details, such as the vendor’s identity or how the hackers stole the credentials, citing the ongoing nature of the investigation.
Snyder did say that since Minneapolis-based Target Corp. confirmed the breach on Dec. 15, it has taken extra precautions such as limiting or updating access to some platforms.
Last week, some card numbers of Target customers from South Texas turned up in the arrest of a pair of Mexican citizens at the U.S.-Mexico border. But experts believe the attack’s original perpetrators will be difficult to locate.
Earlier Wednesday, Attorney General Eric Holder said the Justice Department is committed to tracking down the thieves.
In an appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Holder said that the government also will hunt down any people and groups that exploit the stolen data through credit card fraud.
Target says it is working with the Secret Service and the Justice Department in response to the data breach.
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Related: Justice Department vows to find hackers of Target
But catching them will be hard despite NSA data collection efforts, especially after they ignored the warning signs(?) and now customers need to "arm themselves." You have to ask yourself who benefits and by how much?
US companies poorly armed against cybercriminals
White House offers help to industry on cyberattack
They took care of the poor banks, and I'll tell you, my heart really bleeds for them these days. Quite a bite out of the a$$, huh?
The main point is the erosion of consumers’ confidence that could hinder the economy’s recovery by a few angry birds. The losses were staggering but everything is now back on Target with the support of shareholders (quite a comeback, huh?). I'm going to skip the shopping spree and now that this blog is obsolete. Just be careful checking out at the register.
(At this point blog editor takes break for lunch at P.F. Chang's)
Looks like you will just have to vend for yourself, I guess. The Blackshades that means no one is safe while using the Internet as the operation is traced to Moldova, Arizona and Florida. Not even eBay is safe, and it all tracks back to the same band of criminals from Eastern Europe.
I suppose it is all a gamble, what with all the new domain names.
"Regulator: Sands hackers didn’t steal credit cards" by HANNAH DREIER | Associated Press, February 14, 2014
LAS VEGAS — A Nevada gambling regulator said Thursday the hackers who knocked down all Las Vegas Sands websites for two days and counting did not steal any patron data, including credit card information....
In December, Las Vegas-based casino operator Affinity Gaming revealed its credit card transactions had been hacked and warned its 300,000 customers to take steps to protect themselves from identity theft....
Sands spokesman Ron Reese declined to discuss whether credit card information was breached in the hacking, and instead pointed to a statement the company made on Wednesday....
Gaming regulators are now working to ensure Sands, run by Sheldon Adelson, did everything possible to protect employee information. The hackers, whose identities remain unknown, posted what appeared to be employee Social Security numbers.
What good is all the surveillance and data collection then?
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Related: Las Vegas Sands sites hacked with posts criticizing Adelson
Just wondering how you are paying for all this.
"Charges link 2 Bitcoin operators to illicit drug site" by Larry Neumeister | Associated Press January 28, 2014
NEW YORK — The top executive of a New York City-based Bitcoin company and a Florida Bitcoin exchanger have been charged with conspiring to commit money laundering by selling more than $1 million in Bitcoins to users of the black market website Silk Road, authorities said Monday.
Charlie Shrem, 24, chief executive of BitInstant and vice chairman of a foundation that promotes the Bitcoin currency system, was arrested Sunday at Kennedy International Airport, and Robert Faiella was arrested Monday at his home in Cape Coral, Fla., prosecutors said.
See: Flipping a Bitcoin
Faiella and Shrem conspired to sell more than $1 million in Bitcoins to criminals who wanted to sell narcotics on Silk Road between December 2011 and October, US Attorney Preet Bharara said in a release.
‘‘Truly innovative business models don’t need to resort to old-fashioned law-breaking, and when Bitcoins, like any traditional currency, are laundered and used to fuel criminal activity, law enforcement has no choice but to act,’’ Bharara said.
Over the objection of prosecutors, US Magistrate Judge Henry B. Pitman allowed Shrem to be released on bail, though he required him to submit to electronic monitoring and live with his parents in Brooklyn. They were required to post nearly $1 million in property as collateral.
Assistant US Attorney Serrin Turner said Shrem ‘‘has held himself out as a ‘Bitcoin millionaire’’’ who was ready to flee rather than face charges.
Turner said the nature of the Bitcoin industry meant that Shrem had a ‘‘storage locker in the clouds’’ with money to facilitate flight. He added that Shrem had traveled internationally 16 times since 2007.
Turner played a video interview of Shrem posted online in which the Manhattan resident boasted that if the government tried to make arrests or take down companies that promote the use of Bitcoin, ‘‘I have a plane ticket ready to take me to Singapore. There’s another corporation already set up.’’
Shrem’s defense lawyer, Keith Miller, said there were other videos of his client saying that everybody involved with virtual currency should comply with the law. In setting bail conditions, Pitman said he appreciated that ‘‘sometimes people make statements on video that may or may not carry weight.’’
As the bearded Shrem entered court in a hooded sweatshirt, he waved to his family.
Federal prosecutors in New York said Shrem bought drugs on Silk Road and was fully aware it was a website that let users buy illegal drugs anonymously, among other contraband.
According to prosecutors, Faiella operated under the name ‘‘BTCKing’’ as he ran a Bitcoin exchange on the Silk Road website.
It wasn’t immediately clear who would represent Faiella in court.
Authorities have said Silk Road’s San Francisco operator generated more than $1 billion in illicit business from January 2011 through September on the website, which used Bitcoin, the tough-to-track digital currency, before it was shut down.
The website, which had nearly 1 million registered users by July, let users anonymously browse through nearly 13,000 listings under such categories as cannabis, psychedelics, and stimulants.
It was shut down with the arrest of Ross William Ulbricht, who authorities say masterminded the operation.
He has pleaded not guilty.
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"Mass. regulators warn about bitcoin" by Kyle Alspach | Globe Staff March 19, 2014
Proponents argue bitcoin is faster and cheaper to use than other money-exchange programs or credit cards; it does not, for example, have the transaction fees common to debit and credit cards.
And though the bitcoin system was vulnerable to theft, so too are credit cards, Liberty Teller cofounder Chris Yim said, noting the enormous heist of card data recently from Target Corp., the retail chain.
*******************
The rapid rise of bitcoin and other virtual currencies has flummoxed traditional financial regulators, including those who oversee securities and banks. They are struggling to define the crypto-currencies with traditional financial definitions — is it a banking transaction or an investment, for example — that would then determine how or even whether they should be regulated.
Then it can't be all bad.
So far, only one arm of the federal government, the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, has weighed in definitively, classifying businesses that exchange real currency for virtual currency as money transmitters similar to Western Union that are subject to federal regulation.
But the newly installed chairwoman of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen, recently said the central bank does not have the authority to regulate bitcoins.
The use of virtual currency is “entirely outside the banking industry,” she said during a Senate Banking Committee hearing.
Meanwhile, a group of state banking regulators from around the country, led by David Cotney of Massachusetts, established a task force in late February to investigate digital currencies, including bit coin....
Virtual currencies are not federally insured, so consumers have no protection if they lose money or their accounts are hacked.
Bitcoin has also been associated with unsavory elements. It was the favored currency on the defunct website Silk Road, which allegedly served as a trading post for drug trafficking and money laundering.
And the sudden collapse of the bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox about a month ago has led to mistrust in the currency. In a bankruptcy filing in Japan, Mt. Gox said it may have lost the equivalent of about $520 million to hackers.
Related: Mt. Gox says it has found 200,000 bitcoins worth about $114 million
Court rejects bankruptcy protection for Mt. Gox
Robert Boutwell, a lawyer at Sally & Fitch LLP in Boston who specializes in bank litigation and has written about virtual currencies, said that market acceptance for bitcoin has increased in recent months. Prominent businesses such as Overstock.com and the Sacramento Kings have announced they will accept bitcoins for purchases, he said.
But the lack of regulation, Boutwell added, makes the bitcoin market “akin to the wild, wild West, with enormous exchanges disappearing almost overnight and reports of hacking and stolen bitcoin prevalent.”
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And yet MIT is passing them out?
"Each MIT undergraduate to get $100 in Bitcoin" by Peter Schworm | Globe Staff April 30, 2014
College students are often cash poor. But thanks to a new project at MIT, students will at least have some virtual walking-around money.
Two MIT students have raised more than $500,000 to distribute $100 in bitcoin to each of the university’s 4,500 undergraduates, a donation that organizers hope will spur acceptance of the digital currency and innovation around its use.
Bitcoins, which have been in the headlines for their wild price fluctuations and susceptibility to hackers, can be stored in a “digital wallet” and exchanged in virtual transactions. A handful of area businesses accept them. “Giving students access to cryptocurrencies is analogous to providing them with Internet access at the dawn of the Internet era,” said Jeremy Rubin, a sophomore who came up with the idea for the project, which was announced Tuesday.
The distribution will make MIT the first place in the world where bitcoin is widely distributed, organizers said, creating a kind of laboratory to study how students use it and how businesses respond. Project organizers plan to work with researchers to study the impact. Rubin has teamed up with Dan Elitzer, a graduate student and founder of the MIT Bitcoin Club, to make MIT a hub of bitcoin ventures and research. MIT alumni donated the bulk of the $500,000....
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Related: Digital-currency firm gets $17m in financing
Going main$tream in so many ways makes me di$tru$ it. It may be worth a venture, but I wouldn't want to end up homeless in Silicon Valley. It's a jarring thought and the name is rather cryptic when you think about it. Now that the lobbyists are using it I see it as a threat. Unless it can pay down the debt, and the IRS said so much for that.
"Consumer protection agency issues advisory on Bitcoins" by Sydney Ember | New York Times August 12, 2014
NEW YORK — Bitcoin is in the crosshairs of another federal agency.
On Monday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued its first consumer advisory on virtual currencies, including Bitcoin, and said it would begin accepting complaints about such issues or companies. The agency warns consumers to be aware of hackers and schemes, volatile exchange rates, and a lack of government protection.
“Virtual currencies may have potential benefits but consumers need to be cautious and they need to be asking the right questions,” Richard Cordray, the director of the bureau, said in a statement. “Virtual currencies are not backed by any government or central bank, and at this point, consumers are stepping into the Wild West when they engage in the market.”
Sounds good!
In the bulletin, the agency urges virtual currency users to pay attention to potential hidden costs associated with digital money. For one, the price of Bitcoin can fluctuate wildly. In about five years, the value of Bitcoin has gone from just a few dollars to over $1,000. It is now trading around $580, according to the virtual currency website CoinDesk.
“This is positive for consumers,” said Mercedes Tunstall, a partner in the Washington office of the law firm Ballard Spahr, who has testified before Congress on digital money. “For virtual currencies, the average consumer doesn’t really know how to protect themselves, and they really cannot protect themselves.”
Experts say a lack of government regulation has contributed to this price instability, preventing digital currency from becoming more mainstream. But some Bitcoin supporters say increased regulation could thwart innovation and threaten the freedom the currency was intended to promote.
The agency also warns against the false assumption that Bitcoin transactions are anonymous and urges consumers to be vigilant when transferring digital money and using virtual currency exchanges.
“Information about each and every Bitcoin transaction is publicly shared and stored forever,” the bureau’s bulletin states. “It is possible that others will be able to estimate both how much Bitcoin you own and where you are.”
When it was first introduced in 2009 by a programmer, or group of programmers, Bitcoin largely appealed to antiestablishment enthusiasts and technology buffs who operated on the fringes of the traditional financial system. But as digital money, particularly Bitcoin, has become more popular, it has also caught the attention of government agencies, who are now grappling with how to regulate virtual currency.
In March, the Internal Revenue Service announced that it would treat Bitcoin like property rather than currency for tax purposes. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority have said the currency is risky but have not enacted regulations.
Another issue has also been just how to enforce one country’s policies across nations. One of the most spectacular failures in the currency was the shutting down of Mt. Gox, a Bitcoin trading platform that was based in Japan.
Last month, New York became the first state to introduce proposed regulations for virtual currency companies. The “BitLicense” plan, announced by Benjamin M. Lawsky, New York state’s top financial regulator, includes rules on consumer protection, the prevention of money laundering, and cybersecurity. The new rules are now out for public comment.
Related: PricewaterhouseCoopers Not Above the Lawsky
