[HN Gopher] Toronto crypto company CEO kidnapped, held for $1M r...
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Toronto crypto company CEO kidnapped, held for $1M ransom before
being released
Author : pr337h4m
Score : 47 points
Date : 2024-11-07 20:48 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.cbc.ca)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.cbc.ca)
| datavirtue wrote:
| I hope he didn't kidnap himself.
| tartoran wrote:
| I don't want to speculate but I wouldn't be surprised if he
| planned it all along to run away with customer's money. Not
| unheard of in the crypto world. Hope he makes it home safe.
| gkoberger wrote:
| Hey, maybe. But that's a gigantic accusation to make with no
| proof against someone who was likely in a terrifying
| situation.
| aliasxneo wrote:
| The fact that I'm watching comments like the one you're
| responding to get heavily downvoted, and then all of them
| suddenly propped back up speaks a lot to HN's hatred
| towards crypto.
|
| I mean, I get it, there are plenty of reasons to dislike
| crypto bro's, but immediately suggesting that they
| kidnapped themselves without any other evidence is insane.
| CPLX wrote:
| It's kind of like wondering if a bloody deer by the side
| of the road got hit by a car. Like you don't have any
| evidence that it was hit by a car, it could just as
| easily have been hit by a boat, or a low flying airplane.
| cooper_ganglia wrote:
| No, it's more like wondering if a bloody deer by the side
| of the road got hit by a low flying airplane.
| talldayo wrote:
| > but immediately suggesting that they kidnapped
| themselves without any other evidence is insane.
|
| Insane, or a famous form of security fraud that is
| mitigated by centralized banking systems and therefore
| highly attractive for crypto-owners.
|
| It's a heads-I-win tails-you-lose situation. They were
| either kidnapped because the attackers knew there was
| nothing the CEO could do to defend himself, or he
| kidnapped himself knowing it was plausibly deniable and
| couldn't be tracked through traditional means. In either
| case it's reasonable to examine at the extenuating
| circumstances and wonder why cryptocurrency is such a
| large target for crime.
| neilv wrote:
| It's not _insane_ to have that possibility come to mind
| -- but it 's _unfair_ to individuals to voice a snap
| accusation like that.
|
| Why it's not insane to consider that: people know that
| the cryptocurrency space is full of the unethical, and
| have seen many rug pulls blamed on theft by some
| mysterious unknown other party.
|
| But, even if a $1M kidnapping was one of the standard
| cryptobro scam exits (it's not; it's chump change), you'd
| want more evidence before you start accusing someone who
| might actually be a traumatized victim.
| giarc wrote:
| To run away with money or just simply to get media
| exposure....
| changoplatanero wrote:
| Did they pay the ransom or not?
| cheeze wrote:
| Read the article?
|
| > He was released after a ransom of $1 million was paid
| electronically, a source close to the investigation said.
| neilv wrote:
| (First, I hope that the victim is OK, and will recover quickly
| from trauma.)
|
| Would the kidnapping have been less likely to happen at all, if
| the random had to be paid in physical currency (e.g., paper
| bills, gold)?
| vhcr wrote:
| Of course it would be less likely to happen with physical
| currency, you risk being caught when retrieving the money.
| Etheryte wrote:
| This is starting to look like a recurring theme. A similar
| incident happened this summer in Estonia [0], kidnappers from
| abroad travelled to Tallinn for the express purpose of kidnapping
| the owner of a crypto casino who resides there. Like it or not,
| information about wealth is starting to look like a serious
| safety concern, especially in crypto where retrieving the funds
| later is practically impossible.
|
| [0] https://news.err.ee/1609499827/attempted-abduction-of-
| austra...
| mvdtnz wrote:
| Great idea to have your bank balance on a ledger that's
| publicly available. Another home run from the crypto lads.
| Etheryte wrote:
| While it's very hip to make fun of crypto bros, this isn't
| unique to crypto. You can easily approximate the net wealth
| of any company owner in the EU for example, since business
| registries are open (who owns how much of what company) as
| well as yearly financial statements (how much are the
| company's assets worth in a fiscal year). This isn't unique
| to the EU, it's simply the market I'm personally more
| familiar with, but I hope you see my point.
|
| What makes crypto unique in this setting is that it's easy
| for the kidnappers to receive ransom in a way that's very
| hard to trace back to them after the fact.
| hibikir wrote:
| It's not just about receiving the ransom, but how easy it
| can be to access the original funds.
|
| The story of, say, someone successfully kidnapping Bezos in
| a lightning operation and trying to take a good bite of his
| wealth is quite different than the same if you kidnapped
| Satoshi while he has access to his keys. It's not even in
| the tracing, but how much you can take away successfully,
| and how fast.
| lottin wrote:
| > You can easily approximate the net wealth of any company
| owner in the EU
|
| I don't see how. Unless you're talking about a people who
| owns a significant percentage of a publicly-traded company,
| but that's most certainly not "any company owner". Probably
| less than 1% of the population.
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