Once, drug dealers and money launderers saw cryptocurrency as perfectly untraceable. Then a grad student named Sarah Meiklejohn proved them all wrong—and set the stage for a decade-long crackdown.

“This is the story of the revelation in late 2013 that Bitcoin was, in fact, the opposite of untraceable—that its blockchain would actually allow researchers, tech companies, and law enforcement to trace and identify users with even more transparency than the existing financial system.”

  • ililiililiililiilili@lemm.eeEnglish
    82·
    10 months ago

    That’s crazy that you heard about crypto before it was created in 2008. Are you Satoshi? Did Hal Finney get Internet installed in his casket?

    • BearOfaTime@lemm.eeEnglish
      32·
      10 months ago

      So they were off by one year. This was years ago. Hell, I thought I remember reading about it in 2000,apparently not. I’m probably mentally conflating it with the white papers I was reading in the late 90’s, some of my more technical coworkers at that company (which I left in 2000) were hot on what we now call crypto currency.

    • n3m37h@lemmy.worldEnglish
      15·
      10 months ago

      Sorry I missed a year ya pedantic donkey

      I heard about it around that time and it was as stupid then as it is now

      • sir_reginald@lemmy.worldEnglish
        22·
        10 months ago

        as stupid as they are, if you had installed it and mined it for a few minutes, you’d be millionaire now.

        I assume that’s why they enrage you.

        • zarkanianEnglish
          21·
          10 months ago

          And if you’re at the top of a pyramid scheme, you can become a millionaire, too.

        • n3m37h@lemmy.worldEnglish
          22·
          10 months ago

          Ass U Me more. Money is not a motivational factor for all. There is virtually no benefit of crypto currencies that arent out weighed by all the negative factors.

          If im gonna needlessly waste money it will be for research (folding@home) This is at least benefits others