
Australian drug raid officers seize $350,000 in Cryptocurrency - theweb1
https://zycrypto.com/australian-drug-raid-officers-seize-350000-in-cryptocurrency/
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ryandrake
> There they found “cocaine, computers, mobile phones, a diamond ring, $70,000
> cash and $350,000 worth of cryptocurrency“.

Yet the headline and article largely ignore the other stuff found in the guy’s
home and for some reason focus on the cryptocurrency. I guess it draws more
eyeballs than “cops find a bunch of valuable stuff in drug raid.”

~~~
ianhowson
“cocaine, computers, mobile phones, a diamond ring, $70,000 cash"

From this description, it sounds like the person works for a Big 4 bank.

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caf
Funny you should say that - the itnews article finishes with:

 _NSW Police said that a second search warrant was also executed "at a
financial institution in the city and documents were seized", though no
further details were provided._

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pavel_lishin
I wonder if this means they actually moved the money to wallets under their
control, or if they just took control of the private keys.

~~~
kazinator
No, it likely means that the cops took some monitors and hard drives and
declared that they now have the cryptocurrency.

~~~
bitwize
Agent Ray: "Good news, sir, we've got an uncorrupted hard drive."

Richard Gill: "In English, _please_."

Agent Ray: "It means we've got access to all of his files."

~~~
acct1771
Close enough.

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hndamien
HAHA, they’ll never get my crypto! Cops seize crypto. Cops sell crypto.i don’t
really understand how this keeps happening.

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whatsstolat
Mainstream media article

[https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/national/nsw/...](https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/national/nsw/vaucluse-
man-arrested-over-dark-web-drug-importation-ring-20180608-p4zk7v.html)

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whoopDerpHurr
The amazing thing about this is that cryptography could not be used (or was
simply neglected) in order to secure cryptocurrency.

People did not take care to lock their cryptographically secure currency
behind strong encryption, to preclude awareness of the belongings at all or
siezure thereof.

~~~
DennisP
It's not completely trivial to secure crypto against government confiscation,
without adding risk of accidental loss from hardware failure or forgetting
something.

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paulpauper
they must have been dumb to keep the only copy of the keys on a hard drive.
should have committed the 12 words to memory or put it on an encrypted google
drive or something

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _should have committed the 12 words to memory or put it on an encrypted
> google drive_

This is a stupid strategy to rely on if you've just been arrested.

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pwagland
That's a good guess at the passphrase… but it's thirteen words not twelve :-)

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whoopDerpHurr
13?

[https://brainwallet.io?12#random](https://brainwallet.io?12#random)

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Sir_Substance
I'm guessing that means his storage wallet wasn't BIP38 encrypted. There's a
lesson there, even if we are learning it from a drug dealer.

~~~
quickthrower2
Indeed, it wouldn't surprise me if cryptolocker or it's ilk will look for
bitcoin (etc.) private keys while it's doing it's evil stuff from your PC. So
physical access is not a requirement. To some extent one should assume
everything on your PC could be accessed by a criminal (like your house...
which is why people buy safes)

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samatman
Please update the headline, it's $450,000 worth of cryptocurrency.

[edit] $330,000

~~~
zeta0134
I'm trying to decide if you're joking, or if the cryptocurrency is really that
volatile. That I have to ask is... worrying.

~~~
notadog
He's joking. As of now, the police haven't reported which cryptocurrency was
seized or how much. The police have only stated that "$350,000 worth of
cryptocurrency" was seized.

~~~
lozf
350,000 Australian Dollars is only worth around 266,000 US Dollars but the
article isn't clear about the specifics of either the cryptocurrency or the
fiat.

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5DFractalTetris
...It's unusual to me that Australians do police.

