See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions.
A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.
Not necessarily. A acquaintance of mine at an ISP always did that when police came knocking for "illegale pirating" allegations. His standard response was: Get a warrant or else I would commit a criminal offence (what he would have done).
Nearly never police came back with a warrant.
And in the spare cases they did come back he did provide the data (if it was still available) and never did any equipment get seized.
That was in Germany, USA or where? Just don't tell me Iceland or Sweden (with their famous Pirate Parties)..
Your friend is also a saint with cojones the size of cannon balls for doing that too.
In Poland the "take it all" strategy seems to be the default one, at least for private devices. There was once a case related to one Polish movie being shared on torrents that ended in 40 thousand confiscated PCs. The law firm hired by the movie studio gave the prosecution a list of 40 thousand IPs they said were pirating their client's movie. The prosecution gave a blanket warrant and the police got the people data from the ISPs, confiscated the computers and gave the law firm copy of the personal data so they could offer the 'pirates' a few hundred zloty settlements to not press charges.
If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.
That's a very very slippery slope. It is the job of the police to not look into data not related with the case, not yours.
Surrendering the info would be giving the police more power if anything since, they now can come and get data from anyone without a warrant (how do you even know that this account is dealing drugs other that "the police came looking for him"?).
how do you even know that this account is dealing drugs other that
Take a look at the transaction history. If there are transactions with known drug site wallets, give them the data they are asking for. Otherwise, request they get a warrant.
If you are going to cooperate, I think that's the most reasonable way to go about it.
Bitcoin exchanges are seen as dodgy anyway and they don't have a lobby to fight for them, so showing some way of cooperation while keeping everyone's (legal) interests in mind might be a good idea.
You usually don't know if the address is known drug site wallet, dark markets usually generate unique address for each transaction.
Even if you do know it, you can't know if the user bought something illegal, there is also legal stuff sold on dark markets.
Keeping everyone legal interests in mind means that you don't give personal data to police or anyone else without proper warrant.
The article mentions the specific site and it seems to deal only drugs. They don't keep the money at the generated address, but transfer it to another wallet I suppose?
They may not be explicitly interested in destroying a business, but they may be very interested in seizing equipment and not particularly caring that you don't have a backup strategy.
If the investigators think that you are withholding data or harboring criminals, they can take the equipment. Bitcoins generally don't have the best reputation and they're a small company, so it's more likely they'll get treated roughly be the law if they don't cooperate.
Probably not because of one user, but when the cases pile up there's a good chance it'll raise questions about the legitimacy of their service.
When you earn your money by running said service, you are likely going to want to avoid that.
Comments
See my edit. I'm assuming they can verify the allegations, due to the nature of BTC transactions.
A warrant possibly means that they go out of business, because the servers are physically seized. If you tell me you'd risk that for a stranger who you can tell probably committed a crime, I don't believe you.
Not necessarily. A acquaintance of mine at an ISP always did that when police came knocking for "illegale pirating" allegations. His standard response was: Get a warrant or else I would commit a criminal offence (what he would have done).
Nearly never police came back with a warrant. And in the spare cases they did come back he did provide the data (if it was still available) and never did any equipment get seized.
That was in Germany, USA or where? Just don't tell me Iceland or Sweden (with their famous Pirate Parties)..
Your friend is also a saint with cojones the size of cannon balls for doing that too.
In Poland the "take it all" strategy seems to be the default one, at least for private devices. There was once a case related to one Polish movie being shared on torrents that ended in 40 thousand confiscated PCs. The law firm hired by the movie studio gave the prosecution a list of 40 thousand IPs they said were pirating their client's movie. The prosecution gave a blanket warrant and the police got the people data from the ISPs, confiscated the computers and gave the law firm copy of the personal data so they could offer the 'pirates' a few hundred zloty settlements to not press charges.
C.f. frivolous DMCA on YouTube reviews and this case: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14904149
So much for warrants when it comes to allegations of piracy.
Polish link for the 40k PCs case for anyone interested: https://www.dobreprogramy.pl/Juz-40-tys.-polskich-internauto...
That's a very very slippery slope. It is the job of the police to not look into data not related with the case, not yours.
Surrendering the info would be giving the police more power if anything since, they now can come and get data from anyone without a warrant (how do you even know that this account is dealing drugs other that "the police came looking for him"?).
Take a look at the transaction history. If there are transactions with known drug site wallets, give them the data they are asking for. Otherwise, request they get a warrant.
If you are going to cooperate, I think that's the most reasonable way to go about it.
Bitcoin exchanges are seen as dodgy anyway and they don't have a lobby to fight for them, so showing some way of cooperation while keeping everyone's (legal) interests in mind might be a good idea.
You usually don't know if the address is known drug site wallet, dark markets usually generate unique address for each transaction. Even if you do know it, you can't know if the user bought something illegal, there is also legal stuff sold on dark markets. Keeping everyone legal interests in mind means that you don't give personal data to police or anyone else without proper warrant.
The article mentions the specific site and it seems to deal only drugs. They don't keep the money at the generated address, but transfer it to another wallet I suppose?
Why would the police be interested in destroying a legitimate business just because they want data for 8 users?
They can just as well get the warrant and then get the data the same way they did now.
Lavabit comes to mind. I'm sure there are other examples too.
Some police forces just don't give a shit about what they take, from whom and for how long, see my other comments:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14919912
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14836358
They may not be explicitly interested in destroying a business, but they may be very interested in seizing equipment and not particularly caring that you don't have a backup strategy.
If the investigators think that you are withholding data or harboring criminals, they can take the equipment. Bitcoins generally don't have the best reputation and they're a small company, so it's more likely they'll get treated roughly be the law if they don't cooperate.
Probably not because of one user, but when the cases pile up there's a good chance it'll raise questions about the legitimacy of their service.
When you earn your money by running said service, you are likely going to want to avoid that.