Tag Archives: System D

The Dark Web Drug Lords Who Got Away

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“Despite Ulbricht’s ultimate punishment, the lesson for anyone closely watching the Dark Web drug trade has hardly been one of inevitable consequences. As independent researcher Gwern Branwen has documented in an ongoing survey of more than 70 Dark Web drug markets created after Ulbricht founded the Silk Road, only five of those sites’ administrators have been arrested. For many of the others, the security model Ulbricht pioneered—using Tor and bitcoin to protect administrators, buyers and sellers—has successfully kept law enforcement fumbling in the shadows.”

http://www.wired.com/2015/06/dark-web-drug-lords-got-away/

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Jacob Hornberger: Wrong Message in the Ulbricht Case

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“Forrest’s draconian sentence isn’t even serving to dissuade Silk Road-type competitors from continuing the same type of operation that Ulbricht was operating. Heck, Ulbricht’s competitors and new potential competitors might well be ecstatic that Forrest has removed Ulbricht as a competitor.  What all too many federal officials, including federal judges, have is a notable lack of understanding about economic principles. Maybe that’s because economics is not taught in law school. If they had such an understanding, they would understand that the more they crack down in the drug war, the worse the problem becomes.”

http://fff.org/2015/06/04/wrong-message-ulbricht-case/

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Silk Road Founder Ross Ulbricht Sentenced to Life (and Death) in Prison

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“When you couple the eBay-style reputation engine with the relative anonymity of a black market, you get what we might call a ‘gray market.’ And that gray market allowed those determined to buy certain items — illegal drugs, etc. — to do so in a far, far safer way than ever before.  Silk Road and dark websites like it remove commercial activity from the hands of violent cartels fighting over territory, from the gangland districts of US cities, and from dodgy dealings behind shady buildings.  Second, in a pragmatic sense, the apprehension and sentencing of Ulbricht has not deterred these grey market entrepreneurs.”

http://fee.org/anythingpeaceful/detail/ross-ulbricht-fool-martyr-or-trailblazer

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The Government Tells Ross Ulbricht He Owes It $183,961,921

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“In a memo on Thursday, government prosecutors imposed a money judgement against the Ulbricht equal to $183,961,921. They came to that number based on the transactional records from Silk Road showing the amount of illegal drug sales as $182,960,285 combined with the transactions for fake identification equal to $1,001,636.  The government contends Ulbricht is liable for all transactions on Silk Road because of the structure of the site. Ulbricht will be required to pay the full amount of money, which is likely not dischargeable in bankruptcy.”

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-government-tells-ross-ulbricht-he-owes-them-183961921

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Jeffrey Tucker: The Deeply Tragic Life Sentencing of Ross Ulbricht

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“If you are a tenured professor performing artificial trading experiments in a classroom and publishing your results in expensive journals, you are toasted as a genius and sometimes given prestigious prizes. If you innovate with venture capital funding and the backing of large tech firms, you are rewarded with riches and fame. But if you are a quiet geek who creates a more realistic experiment online, one that actually benefits humanity, and never sought funding from any establishment source, you are swept up in a sting operation and imprisoned for life.  As for the online markets themselves, the jailing of Ross does nothing to stop them. They are now larger than ever.”

https://tucker.liberty.me/the-deeply-tragic-jailing-of-ross-ulbricht/

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India gold smuggling at all-time high, despite Nepali kingpin’s death

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“In two years–since government increased duty on gold to 10% to rein in a yawning current account deficit—gold smuggling has grown by 900%.  That as an accepted principle seizures could be less than 10% of actual smuggling, the figures look even more ominous.  Sources say gold has also begun to be smuggled in ever unique ways and from rather unexpected corners. There is a silver lining to the grim story though. There is an unexpected drop in Nepal which had seen a massive spurt in gold smuggling in the past couple of years. The reason: the kingpin of illicit yellow metal trade in the Himlayan nation died under the rubble of his house in Kathmandu during the recent quake.”

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Gold-smuggling-at-all-time-high-seizures-total-Rs-1000cr/articleshow/47437207.cms

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Record $150m in gold seized by Indian police in 10 months

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“Officials and industry insiders attribute this spike to a ‘high’ import duty of 10 per cent from 2013, a booming demand pegged by the World Gold Council at around 840 tonnes in 2014 – 191.7 tonnes in the first quarter of fiscal 2015 alone, up 15 per cent from the same period last year — and a low prosecution rate of those caught smuggling gold.  At a time when the NDA government announced a monetisation scheme in this Budget to unlock the value of a part of the 22,000 tonnes of gold (US$1trn) in private hands, a big chunk lies with its own Customs departments – over 2,000 kg seized over the past 10 years.”

http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/why-the-gold-rush-record-150mn-seized-in10-months/

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Federal officials stole $1M in bitcoins from Silk Road while investigating it

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“The Secret Service agent, Shaun Bridges, allegedly stole $800,000 worth of virtual currency, according to the complaint, and kept his stash in the exchange known as Mt. Gox. The DEA official, Carl Force, was ‘the lead undercover agent in communication’ with Roberts — a role that gave him the power to extort. Using a series of private, fictitious accounts, Force allegedly told Roberts he would bury evidence related to the case if Roberts paid him $250,000. In another instance, Roberts allegedly paid Force $100,000 in bitcoins after Force, using one of his anonymous accounts, offered up information related to the federal investigation.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2015/03/30/doj-these-federal-officials-stole-bitcoins-from-silk-road-while-investigating-silk-road/

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Citi Economist: Abolish Cash To Enforce Negative Interest Rates

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“In a new piece, Citi’s Willem Buiter looks at this problem, which is known as the effective lower bound (ELB) on nominal interest rates.  According to Buiter, the ELB only exists at all due to the existence of cash, which is a bearer instrument that pays zero nominal rates. Why have your money on deposit at a negative rate that reduces your wealth when you can have it in cash and suffer no reduction?  Cash therefore gives people an easy and effective way of avoiding negative nominal rates.  Buiter’s note suggests three ways to address this problem: Abolish currency.  Tax currency.  Remove the fixed exchange rate between currency and central bank reserves/deposits.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-10/citi-economist-says-it-might-be-time-to-abolish-cash

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North Korea joins new era as property bubble grows

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“It’s a capitalist’s fantasy: a fast-developing city filled with entrepreneurs and speculators, and a soaring property market. Restaurants are opening, shiny apartments are springing up, and the nouveaux riches are indulging themselves with cars, clothes and perfume.  This, however, is not one of the southeast Asian tigers, but North Korea, the most isolated and repressive totalitarian dictatorship in the world.  It is more than 15 years since the country’s communist rulers began to permit the small-scale buying and selling of food and household goods as an exception to its strict socialist economy. Now Pyongyang is experiencing a modest version of that familiar first-world phenomenon: a property bubble.”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/world/asia/article4414908.html

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