One Dread Pirate is on trial; what about the others?MOST internet entrepreneurs dream of transforming an industry.On January 13th, one who may have done just that went on trial in federal court in Manhattan, accused of drug-trafficking, money-laundering and operating a criminal enterprise.Ross Ulbricht, a 30-year-old Texan physics graduate, is accused of being “Dread Pirate Roberts”, the founder and administrator of the Silk Road.This was the first website to make it possible to buy and sell illegal drugs online openly and with relative anonymity.His trial will raise questions not only about the extent and nature of cybercrime, but also about the limits of government snooping necessary to prevent it.The Silk Road was shut down by the FBI at the end of 2013.It worked by combining two new technologies: Tor, which allows people to host websites without revealing where they are based, and bitcoin, a decentralised online currency which offers a close digital alternative to a bag of unmarked banknotes.

On the site, buyers and sellers could trade with remarkable discretion.Over two years, deals generated 9.5m bitcoin in sales (worth $1.8 billion today, though the exchange rate has fluctuated wildly) and over 600,000 bitcoin in commission.That is enough booty to make Blackbeard throw away his cutlass and pick up a mouse.Should the Lions pick all 15 players from one team?A new front in the legal fight over Donald Trump’s travel banQatar Airways wants a 10% stake in American AirlinesIreland and Afghanistan become the first new Test nations in 17 yearsWhy calculating a British parliamentary majority is so trickyHumanist nuptials are popular in Scotland but only beginning in UlsterThe prosecution has already produced evidence that Mr Ulbricht was Dread Pirate Roberts.They argue that he left a digital trail, administering the Silk Road through unencrypted connections and using his personal e-mail address to look for technical help.More sensationally, they allege that he not only set up the site, but sought to defend it violently.

As the Dread Pirate, Mr Ulbricht is accused of paying for the assassinations of several people who threatened the site, including one former employee.None of these murders seems to have happened, but they prevented Mr Ulbricht from being granted bail after his arrest in 2013.Mr Ulbricht says he was framed: the real Dread Pirates remain at large.His lawyers also claim that the FBI may have used illegal methods to identify and seize the Icelandic server on which the Silk Road was hosted, and from which much of the evidence comes.bitcoin auto betThe FBI says the site contained a vulnerability which revealed where it really was, despite Tor.bitcoin price in inrBut several technical specialists think this implausible.bitcoin bank vault

Sadly for Mr Ulbricht, it may not matter much.In a ruling in October, a judge concluded that since he has not admitted any legal interest in the Silk Road server, he is unable to claim under the Fourth Amendment that it was illegally searched, and so the evidence from the server is admissible however it was found.This, the judge admitted, “might appear to place Ulbricht in a catch-22”.If he admits to an interest in the server, he would weaken his defence at his trial; if he doesn’t, he has no chance of getting the evidence against him dismissed.Mr Ulbricht’s defence, which has been generously funded by online donations, is thus likely to focus on the strength of the evidence linking him to the online activities of Dread Pirate Roberts.dogecoin to phpNonetheless, cyber-criminals—as well as other users of the dark web—will be watching closely.bitcoin poetry

Since the Silk Road was taken offline, several similar market-places have been started, and many closed by the authorities.But it is still far from clear whether police forces can crack the anonymity given by technology such as Tor, or how deeply they can legitimately snoop on the web to uncloak the hosts of criminal networks.Andrew Harnik / AP The Kremlin's Investment in Trump Is Paying Off The president’s policies in office have aligned almost perfectly with Vladimir Putin’s goals.mit bitcoin wettenFifty-four years ago this month, former President John F. Kennedy delivered the “Strategy of Peace,” a powerful address that captured America’s indispensable leadership at the height of the Cold War.bitcoin pgp public keyKennedy knew that our country could not guard against the Soviet Union alone, for he believed that “genuine peace must be the product of many nations, the sum of many acts.” Incredibly, the man who now leads the United States seems to find himself locked in an alarming and perilous embrace with the Russian government.ethereal blade life break

These ties threaten to weaken a system of alliances that have held Russia—and countless other threats to the international community—at bay since the conclusion of the Second World War.Continue Reading AP Watergate Lawyer: I Witnessed Nixon's Downfall—and I've Got a Warning for Trump Richard Ben-Veniste on the uncanny parallels between the scandal he investigated and the controversy over the White House’s alleged links to Russia Watching the national controversy over the White House and Russia unfold, I’m reminded of Karl Marx’s oft-quoted observation: “History repeats itself: first as tragedy, second as farce.” I was a close witness to the national tragedy that was Richard Nixon’s self-inflicted downfall as president, and I’ve recently contemplated whether a repeat of his “Saturday Night Massacre” may already be in the offing.litecoin going downGiven how that incident doomed one president, Trump would do well to resist repeating his predecessor’s mistakes—and avoid his presidency’s descent into a quasi-Watergate parody.

The massacre began when Nixon gave the order to fire Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, a desperate effort to prevent him from hearing tape-recorded evidence that proved the White House’s involvement in a conspiracy to obstruct the investigation of a break-in at Democratic National Committee headquarters.Nixon’s misuse of executive power backfired, immediately costing him two highly respected members of his administration: Attorney General Elliot Richardson and his deputy William Ruckelshaus, who both resigned rather than follow Nixon’s directive.Third in command at the Justice Department was Solicitor General Robert Bork, who agreed to do the dirty deed and fired Cox.Continue Reading Lisk Feng What Mormon Family Trees Tell Us About Cancer By searching the church's famed family trees, scientists have tracked down a cancer-causing mutation that came west with a pioneer couple—just in time to save the lives of their great-great-great-great grandchildren.Nobody knew it then, but the genetic mutation came to Utah by wagon with the Hinman family.

Lyman Hinman found the Mormon faith in 1840.Amid a surge of religious fervor, he persuaded his wife, Aurelia, and five children to abandon their 21-room Massachusetts house in search of Zion.They went first to Nauvoo, Illinois, where the faith’s prophet and founder, Joseph Smith, was holding forth—until Smith was murdered by a mob and his followers were run out of town.They kept going west and west until there were no towns to be run out of.They boiled elk horns.The children’s mouths erupted in sores from scurvy.Aurelia lost all her teeth.And so did the mutation.Continue Reading J. Scott Applewhite / AP How the Senate's Health-Care Bill Would Cause Financial Ruin for People With Preexisting Conditions Republicans are going to insist otherwise, but that’s simply not the case.If there was one goal Senate Republicans had set out to achieve in developing their health bill to show they were less “mean” than their colleagues in the House, it was to take away the House Republicans’ green light for insurers to once again discriminate against those with pre-existing health conditions.

Senate Republicans were willing to drive up deductibles and co-pays and be more draconian on Medicaid cuts, but on the one issue of pre-existing conditions they were intent on being less “mean,” as President Trump termed the House bill.Now that the text of the bill has been released, it’s clear that they have failed to achieve that.As they argue for the bill, Republicans are going to claim that it will not allow insurance plans to discriminate against people because they have a pre-existing condition.But that just isn’t the case.The Republican plan may not allow insurers to discriminate against a pre-existing condition through the front door, but they’ve created a backdoor way in.Continue Reading All photos courtesy of Alex Tizon and his family My Family’s Slave She lived with us for 56 years.She raised me and my siblings without pay.I was 11, a typical American kid, before I realized who she was.The ashes filled a black plastic box about the size of a toaster.

It weighed three and a half pounds.I put it in a canvas tote bag and packed it in my suitcase this past July for the transpacific flight to Manila.From there I would travel by car to a rural village.When I arrived, I would hand over all that was left of the woman who had spent 56 years as a slave in my family’s household.Continue Reading Joe Raedle / Getty Images Why Do Democrats Keep Losing in 2017?The party has made gains in special elections, but continues to fall short of outright victory.A string of special election defeats in each state, and with each one, a missed opportunity to take over a Republican House seat, has left Democrats facing the question: Why does the party keep losing elections, and when will that change?The most obvious reason that Democrats fell short is that the special elections have taken place in conservative strongholds.In each case, Democratic candidates were vying to replace Republicans tapped by the president to serve in his administration, and in districts that Trump won.