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Comment by username223 | Hacker News Reader

"why do the states need to monitor financial transactions?"

I hate the "terrorism" BS as much as you, but money laundering and large-scale scamming ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6972139 ) are actual threats.

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> but money laundering and large-scale scamming are actual threats.

Yes, banks launder drug money for cartels. Without the state, who would slap their wrists?

I guess you're trying to be snarky or clever here, but I don't get your point. Maybe you can walk over to your local BofA branch, slap someone's wrist, and feel good about yourself?

HSBC knowingly laundered billions for violent drug cartels, and were fined a mere 5 weeks of revenue. None of the executives involved in this went to jail.

Meanwhile, people's lives are ruined for selling or even possessing small amounts of harmless drugs.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-02/hsbc-judge-approves...

I wonder: with the power of the NSA and the right laws ,maybe it's really easier to track and control bitcoin transactions than control international banks?

That's actually a legitimate concern, which is why people are working on CoinJoin [0]. ZeroCoin and other cryptographic solutions are very interesting but will not be practical for a while due to blockchain bloat and extremely high verification time.

[0] - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=279249.0

like the kind HSBC did in plain sight for over a decade with essentially zero repercussions (the fine was barely enough to break out of 'cost of doing business' territory, so please don't bother with the largest settlement in history uselessness)?

but yeah...bitcoin is bad! cuz...bad people!

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