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Bitcoin Exchange Ordered To Give IRS Years of Data On Millions of Users (gizmodo.com)
Last month, instead of asking for data relating to specific individuals suspected of a crime, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) demanded America's largest Bitcoin service, Coinbase, to provide the identities of all of the firm's U.S. customers who made transactions over a three year period because there is a chance they are avoiding paying taxes on their bitcoin reserves. On Wednesday, a federal judge authorized a summons requiring Coinbase to provide the IRS with those records. Gizmodo reports: Covering the identities and transaction histories of millions of customers, the request is believed to be the largest single attempt to identify tax evaders using virtual currency to date. As a so-called "John Doe" summons, the document targets a particular group or class of taxpayers -- rather than individuals -- the agency has a "reasonable basis" to believe may have broken the law. According to The New York Times, the IRS argued that two cases of tax evasion involving Coinbase combined with Bitcoin's "relatively high level of anonymity" serve as that basis. "There is no allegation in this suit that Coinbase has engaged in any wrongdoing in connection with its virtual currency exchange business," said the Justice Department on Wednesday. "Rather, the IRS uses John Doe summonses to obtain information about possible violations of internal revenue laws by individuals whose identities are unknown." In a statement, Coinbase vowed to fight the summons, which the company's head counsel has previously characterized as a "every, very broad" fishing expedition.
What is the difference between this and the IRS asking for banks to release 3 years of all of its customers records, because cash is anonymous?
love is just extroverted narcissism
....cash should be used whenever possible.
The premise of your question is flawed. BitCoin transactions are NOT anonymous, they are actually tracked *forever* in the block chains which are public records. What's supposed to protect you is that your wallet (a set of Crypto Keys actually) is used to identify parties in a transaction. Where it may not be easy to match the wallet to the person (or entity) making the transaction, but once you do, you can find EVERY transaction made by that wallet from public information.
Those trading BitCoin (which is something impossible to physically trade) must do so electronically, which means you have to use some kind of exchange at some point in order to obtain something of value for your BitCoin (i.e. trade it for something else). It's these conversion transactions where the anonymous nature of those Coins really isn't so safe and one's identity can be revealed. Once you are identified as the owner of a wallet, then everything you've done falls out of the public record in the block chains.
Honestly, nobody knows what the fuck he would say.
Or whether or not he'd change his opinion the next day, depending on who he met with that night.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
I hate it when they use his own words against him.
It makes them look so bad.
There are two types of people in the world: Those who crave closure
As soon as Bitcoin entered common parlance, this became the obvious endgame.
As soon as you could purchase normal day-to-day goods, it became inevitable.
And as much as it sucks ... they're right. Using crypto currency does avoid taxes, even if that isn't the primary intent.
Replace bitcoin with gold in the above statement.
Humans have been using alternatives to taxable currency for a very long time in exchange for goods and services. Mining it out of the earth vs. mining it out of a machine; I fail to see a difference here, and tends to question the tax argument.
Meanwhile, in Ireland, trillions sit quietly...funny how that shit works, ain't it?