Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA director

Re:Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA dir... by boc on Wednesday April 14, 2021 @01:29AM (#26803256)

Cocaine is a highly inelastic good. Bitcoin is highly elastic. It's trivial to ban goods with elastic demand.

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Re:Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA dir... by logicchains on Wednesday April 14, 2021 @01:47AM (#26803369)

> Cocaine is a highly inelastic good. Bitcoin is highly elastic. It's trivial to ban goods with elastic demand.

What do people use Bitcoin for? Buying drugs online! If the demand for drugs is inelastic, then presumably the demand for a way to buy them online is somewhat inelastic too?

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Re:Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA dir... by vincnetas on Wednesday April 14, 2021 @02:09AM (#26803506)

I would think that BTC is not used only for buying drugs. If my numbers are correct daily BTC transaction volume is 290K or 15B€ or 750 tones of cocaine at 20€/g. Thats a lot of cocaine. In 2018 its estimayed that worldwide 1.7k tones were produced totally.

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Re:Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA dir... by lodovic on Wednesday April 14, 2021 @02:59AM (#26803861)

This assumes that the end users buy their cocaine straight from the big drug kingpin. These drugs are paid for many times.

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Re:Bitcoin is a ‘boon for surveillance’, says former CIA dir... by veb on Wednesday April 14, 2021 @03:37AM (#26804117)

That and there's more than cocaine out there on the darkweb.

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