Join our Telegram Channel!Get Bitcoin News stories in Telegram × Dismiss“We can confirm that we have shut down 414 Dark Net sites as part of Operation Onymous.Well, actually there weren’t fully that many, definitely more than 50 though.Ok it was actually 27, but we have definitely struck a major blow.” – Rough description of the success of Operation Onymous.Does anybody else ever get tired of listening to politicians and security personnel, ranting on about how they are going to “shut down the Dark Net”?I think it really underlines their lack of understanding of what it really is.As if shutting it down would be possible.The reality is the Dark Net is huge.It’s almost impossible to determine its size, as none of its sites are indexed.I think that people are fooled into thinking that it’s not that big by articles that say that these Dark Net sites make up just a small portion of the Deep Web.However, when you consider the fact that the Deep Web is 550 times larger than the Surface We, which is insanely gigantic in its own right, you realize that supposed plans to patrol the darknet are erroneous, ridiculous and somewhat laughable.

They could try and shut down Tor, the software that is used to browse the Dark Net, however, there are two main problems with that.Firstly, the US military created Tor, and I highly doubt that the US government would ever be able to admit that created its own supposed worst enemy.As well as this, it would be almost impossible to legally shut down Tor; estimates from surveys of Tor usage show that only about 3.4% of Tor Hidden Service traffic goes to illegal sites.I’d bet that that’s a lower percentage than Google Chrome.The other thing that I would say is that it would be a very misguided move for anyone to shut down the Dark Net, even if it was possible.Firstly, without the darknet, Edward Snowden would never have been able to leak the information about what the NSA was really doing.Information that even some of the highest ranking US politicians had very little knowledge of.That leak was vitally important, and we, the people, had a right to know about it.In terms of the drug sites, many addicts’ health groups have described that the competitiveness of the online market has led to much purer products being sold, meaning drugs bought on the site are much safer than those bought from a street corner dealer.

Furthermore, they have told how the story of the six people who died from overdoses of Silk Road drugs, though heart breaking, should not be seen as proof of the sites danger, but proof of its safety.The Silk Road had over a million regular users, and countless other once off customers besides.The fact that only six people were killed is a miracle, how many hundreds, possibly even thousands, more would have died of overdoses if they were buying from dealers in alleyways?While it was obviously illegal, for its users, it was safer than the real world.The greatest argument against the darknet, are sites that let their users view child porn, however, these make up less than 2% of the Dark Net, and most could realistically be shut down with effective police work.So don’t try to shut down the Dark Net, it won’t work, instead educate people about it, it’s harms and benefits.Do try to stop crime, but maybe focus on terrorists and hitmen before going after whistle-blowers and drug dealers providing safer, purer products than their real-world counterparts.

About Latest Posts Latest posts by Richard (see all) 12 Farmers Arrested for Unlawful Cultivation of Cannabis Demand for Bitcoin Continues to Soar in Venezuela New Mac Malware Spotted on the Dark Web general information purposes onlynot intendedconstitute legal advice ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Why Attempts To “Shut Down The Dark Net” Are Misguided And Unrealistic, / 5 (1 votes)Not that it is completely impossible, in crypto almost anything is possible.But it will be difficult to push the price so low.bitcoin 6th/sThe lower the price goes, the bigger the demand is (at the current level).1 ETH is currently at $7.21.bitcoin miner software deutschFor it to drop to $3 it will have to lose more than half it’s value.ethereal wolves wiki

It has been range bound between $6 and $9 in the past few weeks.And with the rise in Bitcoin’s price, it has been observed that there is a small degree of positive correlation between BTC and ETH.So I think it is a little unreasonable to wait for ETH to plummet down to $3, at this time.What makes you think ETH will fall below the value of ETC?The recent BitLicense carve-outs for software developers and bitcoin miners seem to allow for a level of innovation free from regulation.bitcoin laundering moneySo far, so good.best linux bitcoin mining softwareAt a glance, the New York Department of Financial Services seems to be on the right track.bitcoin value divesProviding a regulatory framework in which bitcoin exchanges, online wallets and merchant processing services can operate is an important step forward in the evolution of virtual currencies and legitimizes their use.

Read MorePolice forced to pay bitcoin ransom However, when one digs deeper into the NFS BitLicense proposal, what we actually see is a regulatory framework that imposes unrealistic requirements on bitcoin users and merchants.You see, a very large part of the regulation deals with trying to remove one of the biggest benefits to society that bitcoin provides: anonymity.BitLicense, as written, forces merchants to collect names and addresses for the simplest of transactions.Can you imagine having to give your name and address at the drive through checkout just to buy a cup of coffee with Bitcoin?That's what the proposal is trying to enforce.So just why is the anonymity aspect such a benefit to society?Since 2013, hackers have stolen over 1 billion consumer records.The estimated cost of this data theft is a staggering $5 billion dollars a year, which inevitably gets passed down to consumers and merchants in the form of higher prices and fees.There is a global data-security crisis.Indeed, a war is being waged — and that's making it harder and harder for the good guys to win.

The hackers only have to succeed a small percentage of the time to make a very big dent on our society.As a result, we are in an era where securing personal information requires more and more complex security and surveillance, by merchants, banks and the government agencies.Read MoreIs Apple Pay a bitcoin killer?The system of credit-card processing introduced in the 1940s and 1950s, perfected in the 1970s and 1980s, was never designed for the 21st century, a century in which the Internet and the open-source community and the dark web accelerate technology innovation at a pace far more rapid than slow moving merchant and banking infrastructure can keep up with.To address this global data security crisis requires us to fundamentally re-think what it means for a consumer to spend money.As it stands today, a simple trip to the grocery store or buying gifts online at Christmas, subjects hundreds of millions of people to potential fraud, identity and credit-card theft.Crimes that may affect their credit record, their finances, indeed even their ability to work.

Moreover, the current approach to addressing these problems, ring fencing, surveillance, detection and tracking is leading us as a society down a very slippery road.It's an approach that means everything we do, every dollar we spend, our location, everyone we talk to, it all needs to be monitored and tracked, relationships mapped, algorithms applied just to catch a very small number of bad actors causing a very large amount of damage.Bitcoin solves these problems, because it does not require us to expose personal information just to go out to dinner or shop online.Every transaction is done with a bearer instrument that does not give the receiver any information that might be used or stolen to exact future payments, or perform any fraud.It's just like cash, only designed for the 21st century, designed for the world we live in now.It protects consumers from identity theft, fraud, and reduces the massive costs associated with processing transactions, opening up global economies and bringing massive new consumer markets into an integrated 21st century economy.

Read MoreWebcam hackers may be watching you Unfortunately, the NFS BitLicense proposal explicitly strips consumers of these benefits, reducing consumer protection, since, as written, it requires bitcoin merchant-payment-processing companies to collect personal identifying information on every transaction, forcing merchants to collect it, thus destroying the huge opportunity that bitcoin presents to solve the global data-security crisis.Requiring this information on every transaction also makes transactions in bitcoin at your local retailer more complex than spending dollars or using a credit card, thus significantly impeding adoption and innovation.Now, according to the NFS, these rules are introduced to protect us from terrorism and money laundering.But, in the world of fiat currencies these draconian AML and KYC regulations are normally reserved for large transactions in excess of $10,000.Not enforced on local shop owners selling pizzas and coffee.So unfortunately, the NFS BitLicense, as written, will greatly stunt bitcoin adoption by applying these rules broadly across all types of bitcoin transactions.

It's an incorrect approach, very flawed, bad for business in New York, bad for Innovation in New York.We are living in an exciting time.The pace of technology innovation and the globalization of our economies have huge potential to lift millions out of poverty and create new and exciting businesses.As a society we should foster that innovation and guide it so that it improves everyone's lives.Bitcoin and virtual currencies are here to stay.Much like electricity, this technology cannot be un-invented; the genie cannot be put back in the bottle.Bitcoin presents us with a huge opportunity as a society to change direction and move away from large centralized repositories of data and indeed control, to a more decentralized, lower impact approach.We should embrace this opportunity, because the current path of surveillance and tracking leads us to an Orwellian future that few would consciously choose.Commentary by Trevor Murphy, the CTO of BitStash, a company that securely stores bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.