from the it-would-be-a-shame-if-you-lost-that-finger-no? dept.
From Nate Anderson over at Ars Technica:
French gendarmes have been busy policing crypto crimes, but these aren't the usual financial schemes, cons, and HODL! shenanigans one usually reads about. No, these crimes involve abductions, (multiple) severed fingers, and (multiple) people rescued from the trunks of cars—once after being doused with gasoline.
This previous weekend was particularly nuts, with an older gentleman snatched from the streets of Paris' 14th arrondissement on May 1 by men in ski masks. The 14th is a pleasant place—I highly recommend a visit to the catacombs in Place Denfert-Rochereau—and not usually the site of snatch-and-grab operations. The abducted man was apparently the father of someone who had made a packet in crypto. The kidnappers demanded a multimillion-euro ransom from the man's son.
According to Le Monde, the abducted father was taken to a house in a Parisian suburb, where one of the father's fingers was cut off in the course of ransom negotiations. Police feared "other mutilations" if they were unable to find the man, but they did locate and raid the house this weekend, arresting five people in their 20s. (According to the BBC, French police used "phone signals" to locate the house.)
[...] And a few weeks before that, attackers went to the home of someone whose son was a "crypto-influencer based in Dubai." At the father's home, the kidnappers "tied up [the father's] wife and daughter and forced him into a car. The man's influencer son received a ransom demand and contacted police. The two women were then quickly freed. The father was only discovered 24 hours later in the boot of a car in Normandy, tied up and showing signs of physical violence, having been sprinkled with petrol."
It's not just France, either. Early this year, three British men kidnapped another British man while all of them were in Spain; the kidnappers demanded 30,000 euros in crypto "or be tortured and killed." The kidnapped man escaped by jumping off a balcony 30 feet high, breaking both ankles.
Or there's the Belgian man who posted online that "his crypto wallet was now worth €1.6 million." His wife was the victim of an attempted abduction within weeks.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by fraxinus-tree on Friday May 09, @10:03AM (31 children)
This is the state of law enforcement and not the crypto whatever.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by zocalo on Friday May 09, @10:57AM (7 children)
Also, don't forget that disposing of stolen crypto is a whole lot less risky than, say, grabbing some expensive bling off a celeb and trying to deal with fences and buyers who are both willing to take the chance of getting busted handling stolen goods. For crypto, you can DIY - convert to another crypto currency with decent anonymity, run through a tumbler, convert back to fiat, and you're done. For those capable of selecting and grabbing suitable targets to use as leverage, that's going to have a considerable appeal, and that in turn makes it a lot more risky to be HODLing.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by negrace on Friday May 09, @02:00PM (1 child)
The "you have sizeable crypto assets is now sufficient" part is too narrow. The real logic is "if you have sizeable assets".
Criminals can now demand ransom to be paid in crypto from anybody.
(Score: 2) by zocalo on Friday May 09, @03:15PM
Those at the top end of the crypto foodchain are probably wealthy enough that they already have suitable security in place, but I'm guessing that many who got in early enough and are sat on a largeish sum of crypto on paper, but not necessarily all that much in fiat, are going struggle with this, both in retrospectively applying PerSec (and good luck with *that* if you're a well known crypto shill) and explaining to members of their families why they need to start looking over their shoulder more than normal, or even to consider things like surveillance detection routes.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 2, Interesting) by shrewdsheep on Friday May 09, @03:14PM (4 children)
I believe that's true if you are very patient and transfer small amounts at a time. Crypto money is being tracked through mixers until checkout by law enforcement.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by zocalo on Friday May 09, @03:30PM (3 children)
The sums involved here also seem to be highly variable - multi-million euros in one example, just €30k in another - presumably based on the target's worth and abilility to pay up, real or imagined. Like the old saw about police not giving a fsck about rap crimes, for a small enough value of crypto I doubt you'll get all that much effort from law enforcement; only one of the examples in TFS indicates anyone was actually arrested, and that was five 20-somethings that apparently didn't even think about cellphone tracking.
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @04:17PM (2 children)
> larger sums require more time to launder
Anything with a public facing blockchain can, by definition, be monitored by anyone - including law enforcement.
The transactions themselves may be "difficult to track" but if you're moving significant quantity of crypto compared with the average daily volumes on these "anonymization" platforms, you're going to stand out, and they can track you through the ins and outs.
It's a bit of an arms race, but dense criminals and traditional law enforcement still end up with the criminals being identified. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7JBXGkBoFc [youtube.com]
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, @04:31PM
That is true, but not because the police are necessarily any good. A criminal covering their tracks has to get it right every time. Forever.
The police only need to get it right once.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 10, @02:09AM
Monero is quite hard to track hence the regulatory response:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monero#Regulatory_responses [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 4, Touché) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @11:12AM (21 children)
This is the $5 wrench being applied to loved ones of idiot braggarts doxing themselves as targets.
If gangs of 5 are kidnapping and mutilating for 30K euros you need to look at your social structure and ask why, and address that. More police is one of the more problematic ways of solving these issues.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by HiThere on Friday May 09, @01:25PM (6 children)
More police is likely a necessary component of dealing with that, but hopefully only on a temporary basis.
OTOH, if governments don't respect the law, expecting other folks to is unreasonable, so you kind of need to depend on threats.
The kind of thing looks more like "greed" than "need", so an effective approach would need to move society away from the "greed is good" idea, and closer to "greed is the root of evil".
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by fraxinus-tree on Friday May 09, @02:06PM
More police is always a recipe for a disaster. And "the greed is the root of all evil" is the road to "someone's greed is OK".
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @02:34PM (2 children)
>More police is likely a necessary component of dealing with that, but hopefully only on a temporary basis.
More police, or better police? One of the big problems with more police is that even on a temporary basis they can be worse than the police you already have.
> away from the "greed is good" idea, and closer to "greed is the root of evil".
That's a good start. I also believe that integration, whether racial, cultural, or societal wealth level, is a good way to break down the "us vs them" mentality that can be found at the root of this kind of behavior, and a lot of basic "fear of others" on all sides. Better police don't bring order through fear.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 09, @09:30PM (1 child)
That's a real problem, alright. This was part of what I meant by "the government not respecting its own laws". "Who will watch the watchmen" is a VERY old problem, and I don't know of any general solution, but when violent crime is out of control you *do* need police to control it. But there needs to be some way to ensure that the police are held to the law. Cameras were supposed to help in that, but when the police are allowed to turn them off, the sort of work in the opposite direction.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @11:05PM
>"the government not respecting its own laws". "Who will watch the watchmen" is a VERY old problem, and I don't know of any general solution
Montesquieu needs a modernization, but the basics were well discussed and addressed in his day. Nothing is perfect, but when you throw out the basics like the US Constitution, then yeah, it goes to hell a lot faster.
> there needs to be some way to ensure that the police are held to the law. Cameras were supposed to help in that, but when the police are allowed to turn them off, the sort of work in the opposite direction.
Society needs to "grow up" and realize that video surveillance is here, it's staying, and it's growing exponentially - regardless of privacy laws.
Florida is a "two party consent" state for recording of conversations, which is a big boost for liars and frauds, but... they have amended that to make exceptions for child abuse and similar "bigger deals." The same is going to go down with privacy laws around video surveillance. Whatever laws might be in place will likely not be a shield for a murder conviction based on illegally recorded video.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, @03:46PM
Why do you think that? The police aren't really all that busy and we keep throwing ever more budget at them. Why would we need *more*?
What do you think the PoPo do all day? Do you imagine they're diligently tracking the nefarious criminals in Moriarty's gang? Please.
They do as little as possible to get through their shift and then they go home. Have you ever actually been a crime victim? Have you reported such a crime? If so, you've seen how ineffectual and often incompetent they are.
I'm absolutely not claiming that ACAB [wikipedia.org] and I don't hate cops. I just feel better when they're not around.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, @08:14PM
That will require a complete redirection of fundamental biological instinct. Something that only happens on an evolutionary time scale. So, maybe in a hundred thousand years or so, "greed is the root of evil" will become the dominant survival trait that carries to subsequent generations
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 09, @02:07PM (13 children)
The obvious answer is that there is insufficient disincentive for those gangs of 5. Social structure goes only so far without legal infrastructure. Law enforcement is what's the problem here. This is standard prisoners dilemma. The gang did the risk evaluation for 30k Euros versus the risks of getting caught and punished significantly.
My bet is that there are already enough police, but there's probably an official disinterest in solving crimes involving cryptocurrency.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @03:44PM (12 children)
The khallow bait still works.
>As an aside, Joe, this is what happens in most of the world
As an aside, denso, these reports come from France and the UK. Where are the reports of Scandinavian millionaires' loved ones being snatched off the streets for ransom? Is it the heavy handed ubiquitous Swedish police force that keeps the criminal elements in check? For contrast: Colombia has lots and lots of private security dedicated to protecting the wealthy there, and their children still get snatched off the streets.
>The obvious answer is that
Scandinavian society has structural differences to the UK, France and Colombia.
> Social structure goes only so far without legal infrastructure.
Agreed. But the reverse is equally true. Laws and enforcement are no substitute for removing the root cause of the "problem behaviors" in the first place.
> Law enforcement is what's the problem here.
In your head.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 09, @05:39PM (11 children)
And there you go again. You weren't proposing publishing income for Scandinavia, but for the US. How law abiding is the US compared to any of the above countries? Come on, you live in Florida. You already know the answer.
They can put the problem behaviors in jail. I'll note for a recent example, that these remains no repeat of the January 6 protests despite over four years of opportunity.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @06:35PM (10 children)
>How law abiding is the US compared to any of the above countries?
And, I would identify that as a root cause of many problems in the U.S.
I'm not saying we need to change anybody's specific behavior - the laws need to be shaped to accurately reflect what is currently expected behavior in society, and then they need to actually be enforced. Children need to grow up not only learning how to behave, but also that the law is an accurate description of how they should behave, and they should expect to be interdicted when they step over the legal boundary, not when they get caught by authorities and how to spend all their time and energy evading detection and prosecution.
Now, the problem comes in when you've got 1/2 of society obeying the law, and 1/2 openly flaunting it - what the actual F do you do about that? At least 1/2 are gonna be unhappy, and given a choice, I'd rather it be the current scofflaws that have to become more law abiding, rather than the law abiding citizens who have to start screwing over their neighbors just to stay competitive.
>They can put the problem behaviors in jail.
But do they, in actual practice. What I see on the news suggests: no.
>that these remains no repeat of the January 6 protests despite over four years of opportunity.
Eyes wide shut? Billboards, bumper stickers and drunk MAGA maniacs have been loudly protesting that "Trump Won 2020" for four years and four months around here. That's a legal protest, but it continues - though it has been getting quieter in the past 100 days.
Now, do the protesters continue to flirt with charges of sedition and insurrection? Killing police officers [uscp.gov]? Not yet.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0, Troll) by khallow on Friday May 09, @09:05PM (2 children)
Currently expected behavior of the criminal population? Think about it.
You don't make it better by making it easier for the criminal half to find victims.
Sigh. "Billboards, bumper stickers and drunk MAGA maniacs have been loudly protesting" aren't illegal activity and thus, not relevant to this thread. The hundreds of felonies exhibited during the January 6 protest is a different matter.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @10:59PM (1 child)
>Currently expected behavior of the criminal population? Think about it.
Bad car analogy:
95% of drivers around here speed at about 10-15mph over the posted limit.
Revise the speed limit laws to hold harmless up to 15mph above the posted limit, conditions permitting, and get serious about enforcement of 16+ over - like: radar+ cameras with plate recognition and texting the driver a warning when first observed, a minor fine when second observed, and fines in line with the current fines for a third and additional offenses within a 30 day period. Put enough radar-camera systems out to realistically catch most drivers on 95%+ of their trips.
Yes, we're all "criminals" but turn that around and get crystal clear about what the highway patrol more or less does 99%+ of the time even when they see you breaking the law.
Bad president example:
Fraud. Unacceptable behavior. Full restitution upon initial conviction, appeals do not delay payment, assets to be seized to make payment if not rendered within 90 days. When appealed the appellate judge can decide what, if any portion of the restitution payment should be held in escrow pending result of the appeals.
The difference:
Speeding is a victimless crime, fraud is not.
Tax evasion? See my collected works regarding flat tax + refund where everyone is presumed to owe exactly the same tax rate at the time of transaction and so it is collected without encouraging everyone to cheat.
>You don't make it better by making it easier for the criminal half to find victims.
You make it better by: A) removing the pressures for criminal behavior, real and imagined, and B) increasing visibility of criminal activity for more thorough interdiction. I'm going to guess that gang of 5 didn't just start their life of crime with a crypto ransom kidnapping. Are we "not respecting their privacy" sufficiently if we step up surveillance of their activities based on prior convictions?
>aren't illegal activity and thus, not relevant to this thread.
You're the one who brought up protests. This is a case where stepping up and enforcing the law in a very visible way did successfully stop the illegal protests. Didn't stop the protests, and I believe it shouldn't.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 10, @01:25PM
That's a bad option. You are openly saying that the law can be broken with impunity up to a limit. The problem is the way the situation has developed in regard to speeding. Allowing 10 to 15 over, and then lowering the speed limits to the point that 15 over is safe.
At this point, the best solution would be a large publicity campaign that they are re-evaluating speed limits, and a new design of speed limit signs, and publicly announced zero-tolerance enforcement for the new signs. You go 36 in a 35 zone, or 81 in an 80 zone, you get a large fine.
Start with major roads and actually raise the limits to what is safe, and keep going until you have them all covered.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 09, @11:53PM (6 children)
This is just a taste. It'll be open season on anyone who shows up high on those income lists. The linked story about is about a Durham family which was home invaded by a gang from Florida just because they had bitcoin. It won't be any different if the victims report a lot of income to a public registry. They'll become a target for anyone anywhere in the US.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday May 10, @12:49AM (5 children)
You got nothing on Florida. We have had multiple young couples break into retirees homes, tie 'em up, steal their (flashy rich) car and whatever else they can get from the house and go to Disney World to spend the loot.
Crypto not required. Doxing of wealth not required, the Cadillac is plenty of indication that there's more than cat food in the cupboard.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 10, @12:57AM
I see you've got some weekend plans, eh Joe? :)
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday May 10, @03:29AM (3 children)
But it's quite clear from the many examples we've seen, including yours above, that it makes the problem worse.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday May 10, @09:30AM (2 children)
>But it's quite clear from the many examples we've seen, including yours above, that it makes the problem worse.
In your head.
Every real property owner in the US is already doxxed by their county property appraiser, with current appraisal and assessment to the nearest dollar. Full real name and mailing address included along with the legal description of the property.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday May 11, @05:54AM (1 child)
How will we be looking up this information? Will your income and tax information only be accessible from the county property appraiser too with you having to appear in person to get the information? Or are the feds just going to stick it on a website and apologize when someone downloads the whole data base and sells it to everyone in the world? If the information is hard to get to (I of course fall on the side of making it impossible without a court order), then it'll be much less of a problem. But your "anyone anywhere" sounds like a centralized data base with crime enablement.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday May 11, @10:54AM
>Will your income and tax information only be accessible from the county property appraiser too with you having to appear in person to get the information?
What rock have you been living under for the past 20 years? Every single place in the US I have ever been mildly curious about property values, the information is available online without even an account sign up.
>are the feds just going to stick it on a website and apologize when someone downloads the whole data base and sells it to everyone in the world?
You mean like Title companies have done for centuries? I am not aware of anyone trying to sell real estate appraisal info by itself in bulk, it's too easy to get yourself, but.there certainly are scraper aggregators out there who combine it with other public records like court cases and various other things that they sell.
Go back under your rock, it's less challenging to your preconceived misconceptions.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, @11:49AM
I'll save you all the trouble: https://xkcd.com/538/ [xkcd.com]
(Score: 3, Informative) by DannyB on Friday May 09, @02:26PM (6 children)
A person isn't be kidnapped because they have a lot of crypto currency. Nor that they brag about having lots of crypto currency. They will be abducted for the usual reason: because they have the ability to pay the ransom. The kidnapper doesn't care if the victim already has crypto currency. The kidnapper only cares that the victim's friends and family (if they have any) can access the crypto currency, or are able to convert other assets into crypto currency.
Crypto only enters into this because it is
untracableless traceable than cash, a bank check, or rhodium dabloons. The kidnappers have even more anonymity in collecting the ransom. No cash drop off locations under FIB surveillance. No specific payment time, other than a deadline. Which is maybe where the word DEADline comes from?The only way to stop a bad guy with a can opener is a good guy with a can opener.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Friday May 09, @02:41PM (3 children)
There's less friction if they already have crypto.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 09, @04:00PM
That's as may be, but I still get these emails (sent to the abuse and NOC email addresses of the domains I own) almost every day, sometimes every day:
Note that the scammer above is obfuscating their message with UTF8 characters which look similar to ascii characters.
Oh, and by the way, I don't have a camera attached to any of my general purpose computer systems, and I only use my phone for -- wait for it -- making phone calls. This is straight up bullshit, hoping to frighten folks into paying up -- in cryptocurrency.
But that doesn't stop these folks. The above is the "cold calling" version of such scams/crimes (extortion is a crime in most places), whereas the kidnappings are based on "hot leads" (i.e., folks boasting about their valuables -- cryptocurrency or not -- but cryptocurrency is the new hotness and criminals aren't immune to marketing).
My finances are *my* business and I keep such information to myself. I might have tens of millions worth of BTC in a wallet. Or I may have none at all. But I'm not dumb enough to share that information with the whole world.
As such, this sort of thing isn't as blatantly a "tax on the stupid" as the lottery is, but close.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by DannyB on Friday May 09, @07:05PM (1 child)
While that it true, I think the advantages of the anonymity of crypto is the primary reason to use it for ransom payments -- not because it is easier for the victim's family and friends to pay the ransom. In fact, asking for a ransom in crypto currency may greatly increase the friction in paying a ransom if those people never use crypto. And I would venture to say that many ordinary people do not use crypto.
The only way to stop a bad guy with a can opener is a good guy with a can opener.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday May 09, @07:06PM
Clarification: The kidnapped person may have crypto, but that doesn't mean his friends or relatives have ever even heard of crypto currency.
The only way to stop a bad guy with a can opener is a good guy with a can opener.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 09, @04:27PM (1 child)
> because they have the ability to pay the ransom.
Don't forget: because they're readily identifiable - and there's also a bit of "the asshole deserves it anyway" involved as well. Not that gangs won't abduct "good people" - but they're less likely to abduct people and family members of people who they like / respect.
> The kidnapper doesn't care if the victim already has crypto currency.
Yeah, but no. If the victim already has large quantities of crypto they have not only the ability to pay, but likely the ability to pay more quickly. Ever try moving even $25K out of a traditional bank on short notice? It takes a lot more than a click in a crypto-wallet.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday May 09, @09:08PM
It's trivial to come up with excuses to demonize someone. Merely being able to pay a ransom is more than enough.