Slashdot Mirror
Coinbase: We Will Send Data On 13,000 Users To IRS (arstechnica.com)
Coinbase has formally notified its customers that it will be complying with a court order and handing over the user data for about 13,000 of its customers to the Internal Revenue Service. Ars Technica reports: The case began back in November 2016 when the IRS went to a federal judge in San Francisco to enforce an initial order that would have required the company to hand over the data of all users who transacted on the site between 2013 and 2015 as part of a tax evasion investigation. Coinbase resisted the IRS' request in court. But by November 2017, after a hearing, U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley narrowed the request to only cover 13,000 particular individuals. The San Francisco-based startup is now required to provide "taxpayer ID, name, birth date, address, and historical transaction records for certain higher-transacting customers during the 2013-2015 period." Coinbase reminded its users that it is "unable to provide legal or tax advice." The company also noted, "If you have concerns about this, we encourage you to seek legal advice from an attorney promptly. Coinbase expects to produce the information covered by the court's order within 21 days."
Uh-oh. I think that some dumb people are going to be in a lot of trouble.
I don't respond to AC's.
ho ho ho...
I don't understand why the IRS even needs the cooperation of Coinbase. Large transactions have to be reported by financial institutions anyway. The cash (fiat) would have to flow through either in or out of Coinbase through some financial instutution. So the government already has all the information they need.
What did you expect? Just declare the income (it's probably long-term cap gains anyway), pay your taxes, and move on. Don't mess with the IRS; government moves pretty slowly on most things, but it's going to get paid right now.
Glad I spent all that time entering all 200+ transactions I had with coinbase into my taxes. Took a while and was mind numbingly boring but well...
You don't have to pay taxes on it until you convert it back out of crypto-currency. I think a lot of people will hold onto it until they can cash out at a lower tax rate (either in retirement or by moving to a lower tax locale).
http://www.coinoshi.com/52-ico...
... are a security vulnerability." - Nick Szabo.
Usable decentralized exchanges are almost here.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Shouldn't they need to have probably cause to pull the data from all 13k users?
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I'm NOT a Luddite, but... Which of course means I'm about to say something that will require a lot of clarification to avoid that accusation, eh?
I'm dubious that there is a legitimate need for cryptocurrency. I am NOT rejecting the broader idea of electronic currency. Apart from the convenience, which has some legitimate (though usually overrated) value, the special (narrow) thing about cryptocurrencies is the extra privacy that some people want. If using cryptocurrency makes you MORE vulnerable to intrusion into your privacy, then mission NOT accomplished. Even a YUGE FAIL, as #FatNixon would say. Of course you think you have a legitimate need for truly anonymous payments, but that's what all the criminals say, even if we stipulate that you, personally, aren't one.
Now for the big rub: Competition, as in there ain't any. There are an infinite number of possible cryptocurrencies that can be created, and no real value to any of them. There's slight prestige (which is supposed to have some value) attached to being the first one with some feature, but no way to prevent the creation of an infinite number of other cryptocurrencies that have that feature and any others you like.
That's the problem with infinity. Whatever value something might have, if you get to divide that value by infinity, you get nothing of real value. No one gets to carry an infinite wallet for the infinite sums you need to play that game.
The speculative value of cryptocurrencies is something completely different. The crucial problem here is actually best described as a Venn diagram. Some of those speculators were legitimate gamblers who just hoped to make a lot of easy money out of nothing, but there is an intersection with some actual criminals (especially tax evaders), and quite probably even including the thieves who ran off with the fake money that started this entire fiasco. Kind of hilarious if this extra bit of greed leads to their arrests, eh?
Now what about the LEGITIMATE use of personal information to build an EPR (Earned Public Reputation) that would help us deal with each other on fairer terms? Don't hold your breath, especially waiting for Slashdot to improve.
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
I didn't use coinbase in that period of time but I now would just about fit into their parameter of minimum money transacted because of my large mining operation. Instead of just adding a separate line item on my taxes for a 1099-MISC or INT or whatever, I wrap it into my LLC's income because Nicehash mining is technically selling as service, not capital gains from creating spontaneous currency. But they would almost definitely audit me if I was in this list, which would be a needless hassle and it'd be based on NOTHING other than the fact that bitcoins are scary and we're all tax evaders, right? That's a rumor. What the IRS really needs is evidence and they have none. They better not waste my time with this BS in later years.
the Coinbase guy seems to be making a valid argument and getting bitch slapped by the judge because he (she?) isn't a very good lawyer.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvtPf_YfOUM
and remember, April 15 is just around the corner.
Haven't seen a technology related news here in ages, just shitposts about scams.
Banks already have to do this to fight "money laundering" and "financing terrorism" (in actual reality, this is purely about tax evasion...) and companies like Coinbase are in some sense banks. They have no chance to deny such a request and, unless the cryptocurrency in question has strong anonymity (like Monero) and you are always strongly anonymized when accessing it or use your own wallet exclusively, there is no way the feds will not identify you eventually.
I am beginning to think that all this hype could have been about (really stupid, but rich) people trying to evade taxes and that the speculation angle actually is kind of a side-show.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
1) Why would Coinbase need to collect things like dates of birth or physical addresses in the first place?
2) What motivation would anyone have to provide the correct details even if they did ask?
3) Why would anyone doing something dodgy use a coin exchange in their own country?
So now that precedent has been set, will other governments follow?
As a currency exchange, wouldn't they already have to report transactions to the IRS?
Or likely will be in Canada. I've always known that the exchange where I put my CAD in and take it out was reporting to Revenue Canada. I'm pretty sure most people with a large amount of crypto currency now it and are expecting to eventually be taxed. Now I also know enough people with enough money to make it worth their while to move somewhere with a lower tax rate when they do take the money out. Also most people with a large amount of crypto currency are holding it in wallets and multi exchanges.
We've been slashing the IRS staffing so dramatically in recent years that it is rather unlikely anything would be done with that information.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
If so-called cryptocurrencies are really good innovation, why they attract so many criminals/criminal activity?
Could it really be because, all cryptocurrencies themselves are scams, and that is why they attract all kinds of criminals/criminal activity?
If so-called cryptocurrencies are really currency, why no company/store can use Bitcoin as currency anymore?
Because the price of Bitcoin proved to be extremely unstable to use as a currency?
Would the result be different, if Bitcoin replaced by any other "cryptocurrency"?
Aren't all work the same way?
Or, they are not actually virtual currency but virtual investment?
But, if they are actually investment, why we need/want them?
What would happen to world economy, if people invested in virtual investments, instead of real investments?
Or, all so-called cryptocurrencies are actually just a modified (made decentralized and paying variable interest) Ponzi Schemes?
(Price of cryptocurrencies would keep increasing in the long term (by their design), so it is equivalent of paying variable interest to all long term investors.)
As more and more people invest in cryptocurrencies, it will become harder and harder to ban their trading everywhere!
All cryptocurrencies need to be banned globally before it is too late!
which only shows gross proceeds. They do not send your entire transaction history, which would show cost basis, etc...
basically if you're reporting your taxes properly with either capital gains or income and the gross proceeds come into ballpark of the 1099-K, you're about as likely to be audited as anyone else not cheating on their taxes.
scary!
If you want to avoid the IRS it is profoundly dumb to do business with a US company.
Same as if you want to avoid the NSA, or the FBI, or the MAFIAA, or whatever.
Ha ha ha ha ha ha... stupid idiots.
This is the exact reason why I keep all my cryptocurrency under my mattress.