Hearing from my source in the court that the samourai guys pled guilty to money transmission in exchange for the money laundering charge getting dropped. They’ve stated they won’t seek appeal if the sentence is five years or less. The judge is a bit of a hardass apparently so expect the full 5 years. With good behavior etc… roughly 4 years likely.

Replies (46)

juniper's avatar
juniper 6 months ago
And this is one of the biggest risks to BTC. Node runner = criminal.
Samourai Wallet was a Bitcoin wallet built to give people real privacy using CoinJoin to break chain surveillance. The devs were arrested by US authorities for basically writing open-source code, and now the government is trying to criminalize privacy itself. This is bigger than one wallet, it’s about whether we’re allowed to use Bitcoin privately at all.
They actively collected fees for their Coinjoin, Paynym and some other services. Some of these did not even require a central server (like Paynym, Stonewall and collaborative transactions) but a fee was still taken by Samourai Wallet developers. They also have the capability to comply with the OFAC address list on their coordinator, but have decided not to. Other things include that they possibly could have traced all of their users… I sometimes can’t feel bad for them when they literally poked the bear multiple times, while also giving the government every excuse to shut it down, and also being extremely shady.
tl;dr none of that is even close to running a Bitcoin node. also fyi many influencers like Odell have a financial incentive in Samourai wallet, and I remember the Samourai wallet team displaying many characteristics similar to NVK.
No one wants to hear this, but the path forward is to lobby DC. More FOSS while part of the solution is not going to get us the win we need. If AIPAC can ensure Jews get all the benefits and protections they want, then why can’t Bitcoiners create PAC to advance our agenda? Neglecting politics has been to our detriment. That has changed recently, but we gotta keep pushing.
IANAL. But they have profited from crime *knowingly*, which is problematic. They also could control which CJs to accept and which to reject, before the mixing started.
Right. It’s because this is a plea and a plea is not a judicial decision. Had they lost in court and been found guilty than that would have set precedent. This is a negotiated settlement to avoid trial.
Default avatar
nobody 6 months ago
Jews control the US government. I’m sure paying and bribing jews to give you power will work out great. Just look at all those Trump donations are working out. LOL
+1 We need to get broader support from the community. No more “politics don’t matter”
Jews influence on our politics is a separate issue, but the point remains that they are proof of concept. They didn’t always control things. No reason why Bitcoiners can’t achieve a similar level of influence and control. All the Trump donations got Ross out of prison, an SBR created, and removed hostility from banks towards bitcoin businesses. You don’t have to be part of the solution, but at least get out of the way.
Samurai died so we may live. Bitter day. Privacy still being attacked. Reading the Roman Storm case. Gov doesn't give a shit about individual privacies. We're on our own.
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nobody 6 months ago
I’m not sure why you fagtrons want to save the Masonic slave empire. I guess you still believe in muh freedoms and sing yankee doodle dandy. Muh founding fathers, muh Declaration of Independence. Collapse all these centralized power structures. Bitcoiners want the power. I hope all the bitcoiners that gravitate to the ZOG get burned as they deserve.
John Smith's avatar
John Smith 6 months ago
Some devs made a bitcoin wallet with lots of privacy increasing features. The main one being a CoinJoin coordinator. You could join at least 5 other ppl to make 5 new utxos by paying a fee to the Samourai devs that made the coordination. Once you pay once you could re-do the CoinJoin as many times as you wanted with different ppl, thus breaking any possibility of chain analysis from that point on. The US government hated this and claimed that it was 'money laundering' and other made up charges and cracked down the dev team. They have been trying to defend their case since then. It's an attack on privacy most likely to make an example out of them to suppress other ppl from trying to do the same, since it was all open source and all the dev team did was write the code. It seems the US gvmt hate if ppl make tools that anyone can use to gain more privacy.
Lol like I said, you’re welcome to continue being a loser incel in your shit hole country I’m talking to the people that care about bitcoin and want to wield political power so developers don’t go to jail.
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nobody 6 months ago
If you and hodl want to give jews your bitcoin, fuck kids and kiss the wall to help bitcoin then that’s totally your call. Godspeed.
So they are taking a hit that, in part, benefits the rest of us. Or at least avoids a worse global outcome. I mean, I guess that’s at least a cherry on top of the shit sundae they got served.
Jose Sammut's avatar
Jose Sammut 6 months ago
You didn't read what he said. There's no mixers on lightning.
Jose Sammut's avatar
Jose Sammut 6 months ago
You can campaign on more than one issue. The libertarians were strategically important in the last election, and there were promises made to that effect. If we continue to campaign we'll have more promises kept and new ones made. We can also campaign on Epstien, and on Gaza, and on privacy, and tax exemptions, etc. Bitcoiners have a higher propensity to save, so our time and money spent should be relatively more targeted and efficient. Paying up to the Jews is not the only way to get things done. Also, you can put a price on your freedoms and pay it up. It's something that people do.
Irrepressible's avatar
Irrepressible 6 months ago
I fukin hate the government. How did we let it come to this.
If you're serious about privacy it's still good practice to CJ before and after opening and closing channels. Lightning is much more difficult to use in a private way than Monero. Most people using it are on custodians or with large LSPs that basically see everything because of that. Pair that with optional privacy upgrades almost no one uses like blinded paths. It's all over the place.
Gatzby's avatar
Gatzby 6 months ago
I wish they'd acknowledge this instead of promising them that it's better than xmr privacy by default without verifying.
Gatzby's avatar
Gatzby 6 months ago
You have privacy on lightning as long as: -you run your own node -You trust and verify your peers -You trust they won't close your channel this revealing your channel information on chain -you have faith that you aren't being targeted for probing or timing attacks I bet you secretly worship lightning in private devotion to come out with that much faith in it's privacy.