Recently agitators in the United States along with officials in various government capacities have been exploiting a recent minor tragedy to in an effort to censor the most potent symbol of rebellion against the federal government of the United States. In mere anticipation of backlash retailers including Walmart, Ebay, Google shopping, and the Apple App Store have pre-emptively removed all merchandise with the image of the Rebel Flag from sale. What sort of crime could make the ultimate symbol of rebellion against the federal government of the United States, one which was actually flown in combat against the Axis powers in World War II. Continue reading
Category Archives: Scams
Carl Mark Force IV to Plead Guilty
Carl Mark Force IV, formerly of the United States Drug Enforcement Administration has reportedly entered an agreement to plead guilty charges stemming from his theft of Bitcoin from the Silk Road marketplace. This plea agreement follows that of Shaun Bridges who was charged the same day as Force IV in an unrelated case of theft from the Silk Road. Force IV is expected to enter his guilty plea formally in court on July 1st, 2015. Working for a venture called CoinMKT Force IV further committed theft from one of that firm's customers by freezing the customer's account balance and repossessing the value for himself. Force IV converted most of his stolen and extorted Bitcoin value to the local currency of the United States and had the local currency wired to bank accounts under his control adding to the evidence prosecutors were able to use to damn Force IV.
Shaun Bridges Pleads Guilty to Silk Road Theft
Shaun Bridges who was charged the same day as Carl Mark Force IV has plead guilty to money laundering and obstruction of justice charges. Bridges as an agent of the United States Secret Service used passwords he coerced from a customer service representative of the Silk Road to move what prosecutors describe as $820,000 in Bitcoin value to a Bitcoin address under his control from Silk Road accounts.
CoinJar COO Ryan Zhou Caught Impersonating Dice Site's Developer
Co-founder and COO of CoinJar Ryan Zhou – better known as Zhoutong and for his involvement in the two thefts which plagued Bitcoinica back in 2012 – has been found once again with his hand in the cookie jar this time impersonating the developer of the bitcoin gambling sites BitDice.me and DogeDice.me on the subreddit /r/bitcoinmarkets.
Starting with a now deleted post in which an unknown user – arguably Zhoutong himself – complained that BTC-e had locked their account containing over 100 BTC and would not release the funds unless the user was forthcoming with identity documents. BitDice.me has since confirmed BTC-e locked the user's account at its behest after the funds were withdrawn from the dice site earlier this year when a user exploited the fact the dice site's administrator foolishly left test code on the live site which enabled users to add the site's own bitcoin to their account. Continue reading
Bandits Stick Up Craigslist Bitcoin Seller
The dangers of trapping has once again reared its head in the city of New York with CNBC reporting (archive) a 28 year old man who attempted to sell bitcoins via craigslist met with a purported buyer who then lead him to a vehicle to finalise the transaction. Hidden in the back seat of the car was another man who ordered the seller to transfer the bitcoins to his wallet at the point of a gun. In addition to the USD $1,100's worth of bitcoin, the bandits stole the man's mobile phone. Continue reading
Former Vault of Satoshi Customers Can't Collect
The Brantford Expositor reports that Vault of Satoshi still has a number of customers whose funds have not been returned, even though Vault of Satoshi ceased operations back in February. Expositor reported Susan Gamble along with general allegations against Vault of Satoshi's operators present the story of a customer, Scott Campbell: Continue reading
EFF Goes to Bat For Podcasters, Hits Homerun Against Patent Troll
Continuing to keep its shiva hands full and not content with just tackling the videogame industry, the EFF has just helped to win a decision with the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) that invalidates the "podcasting patent" held by Personal Audio LLC, a Texas-based patent trolling firm. Personal Audio LLC is famous for having squeezed $8 mn from Apple Inc. in 2011 for the fruit company's use of "navigable playlists" on its iPod music players, as well as having sued American comedian Adam Corolla for distributing podcasts, only to be counter-sued before the two parties quietly settled. Continue reading
Obama Initiative Promotes Linkrot
More than one thousand websites in the United States .gov top level domain have gone offline since a 2011 memorandum (archived) issued by the President Obama with the stated intent of "improving online services." While the utility of many of the particular domains and sites hosted on them is debatable, Obama's aggressive culling has the primary effect of making the internet presence of the United States government less useful and far less reliable. Continue reading
Coinbase Outgoing Email Hacked
As noticed by #bitcoin-assets user fluffypony, and later confirmed by reddit user CoinbaseAdrian, a sendgrid.net account associated with em.coinbase.com has been compromised. The scammers behind this attack have used it to send email to a list composed mostly of, but not limited to, users of localbitcoins.com. Continue reading
Olivier Janssens: Bitcoin Floundation Out Of Money, Hates Transparency
A mere month after having been elected to the Bitcoin Floundation, Olivier Janssens has gone public to announce what most of us already knew – the scam foundation has very little money left and that the way in which it has been run to date is to blame for its coming bankrupty.
Janssens writes: (archive) Continue reading