TorrentGalaxy Pleads Financial Difficulties, Asks Users to Chip In (torrentfreak.com)

submitted 1 week ago by TheImpressiveX@lemm.ee to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com

14 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 45 points 6 days ago

Soliciting donations and using fucking bitcoin of all things is mind blowing to me. How are you gonna get your money out without everyone tracing you?

[-] uxellodunum@lemmy.ml 1 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

Bitcoin is pseudonymous - Transactions are transparent, yes, but the addresses are not linked to any PII - The exception comes in when the user uses a Centralised Exchange that does exactly this, it bridges anonymous addresses with PII via KYC.

Bitcoin can be sold anonymously using P2P DEXs (decentralised exchanges), where the fiat transaction has no link to Bitcoin.

That's assuming they even would want to sell.

All in all, it comes down to how the user uses the tool. Bitcoin can be as privacy preserving as anyone wants. But if they KYC, they can kiss any privacy goodbye, and really, that's the misunderstanding that has reached most non-Bitcoin users these days. Experiences based on a lack of understanding.

[-] TheMachineStops@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 3 days ago

Wow, seriously why are they using bitcoin? XMR is untraceable, why use a traceable currency?

[-] tryptamine@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 6 days ago

Unless the site has been high jacked by the feds and they want to be able to track people 🧐

[-] Flatworm7591@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 6 days ago

Would they go to all that effort to nab a few downloaders? They don't even get prosecuted if caught, usually.

[-] tryptamine@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 6 days ago

Just off the top of my head, they could be using the evidence of a person donating to a torrent group as probable cause to see what other illegal activity that person has been up to…

I was mostly joking in response to why a torrent tracker would be asking for donations in a cryptocurrency that can be traced…

[-] crazyminner@lemmy.ml 6 points 6 days ago

Could you not do BTC to XMR then to w.e else after that? And if youre donating you should do XMR to BTC.

[-] Chewy7324@discuss.tchncs.de 16 points 6 days ago

Another problem with BTC is the extremely high transfer costs. Donating XMR directly makes smaller donations viable, while BTC is only attractive for large donors.

[-] uxellodunum@lemmy.ml 2 points 22 hours ago

Not exactly. Lightning makes it super cheap and instant.

[-] Chewy7324@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 20 hours ago

Interesting. I thought Lightning was a fork like BTC Cash, not a feature compatible with BTC itself.

On another note I just noticed it's gotten harder to buy Monero in the EU, at least Kraken no longer offers them (damned money laundering, sadly the laws are necessary). Luckily thanks to legalization I no longer use it.

[-] uxellodunum@lemmy.ml 2 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

Lightning is indeed NOT a fork of a Bitcoin, it's essentially a Layer 2 for Bitcoin (if you think in terms of the Internet's TCP/IP model). It solves pretty much every use case created by any Altcoin when competing with Bitcoin, as Bitcoin chose security and decentralization over scalibility in its base layer (on-chain).

As for buying Monero, I only deal with Bitcoin, but I'm pretty sure you can easily buy Monero still as long as you don't use centralised exchanges (permissioned), and instead use Decentralised ones (permissionless). That'll be the case for any altcoin that still has decent popularity for the foreseeable.