Iran Demands Bitcoin For Ships Passing Hormuz During Ceasefire
He said that the tariff is $1 per barrel of oil, adding that empty tankers can pass freely. "Once the email arrives and Iran completes its assessment, vessels are given a few seconds to pay in Bitcoin, ensuring they can't be traced or confiscated due to sanctions," Hosseini added.
https://slashdot.org/story/26/04/08/1746237/iran-demands-bitcoin-for-ships-passing-hormuz-during-ceasefireOpen linkView original on lemmy.dbzer0.com
113 replies
No Uncle Sam's paper dollars? ohh boy
That's gonna upset Donny Boy
They own a bunch of it, though.
Bitcoin is for dodging sanctions and the influence America has over the international banking and payment systems. It's also may shield third parties from sanctions the US may impose on those who transact with Iran.
Reminder that bitcoin is not now nor has it ever been anonymous.
Neither is a bank account though either. And one is sanction proof, the other isn't.
Doesn't need to be it's just irreversible. That's why north korean randsomeware has worked forever.
It wouldn't have anything to do with tracing transactions to North Korea being pointless and unactionable I'm sure.
It also means that if there's a secondary deal trump's Bitcoin account get it's cut right after Iran takes theirs
Honestly, the biggest mistake they've made here is that they're not demanding Monero instead.
It's easier for people to get Bitcoin, Iran could deal with the cleaning / mixing themselves after. This is already going to create friction so keeping it lower might help?
Oh, if they demanded Monero, people would figure out how to get it.
theres only like 6.5B usd worth of monero (compared to ~1Trilion BTC)
At 20Milion barrels of oil (/ dolars if its $1 a barrel) a day, theyd own all the monero within a year, meaning theyd have told pretty actively be selling it back onto the market for another currency to keep a supply for shippers to use. Compared to BTC where they'd need 136 years of hoarding to accumulate it all
The huge demand spike would increase the value of any coins quite a bit so your napkin math doesn't quite hold. It would basically make monero a new petro backed currency.
Right? I was like dang you're already half way there lol.
The reason though is that they probably don't want to discourage payments because I have seen businesses refuse to use Monero in ransomware attacks because their insurance agreement complicates payout on a fundamentally untraceable currency. Even if Bitcoin is technically decentralized, they can report the transaction and specific currency blocks to whatever federal agency is responsible for fraud.
Still, why not offer both and put a 5% discount on Monero.
That idea of a 5% discount doesn't sound like such a bad idea.
I never even considered the insurance side there. But it is legit proof of delivery and it gives them at least a chance of recovery if someone fucks up cleaning them.
Yeah and writer has no idea what they are talking about. One of the core characteristics of Bitcoin is being publicly traceable
I mean it doesn't even matter that it is. It's not a secret who the money is going to.
The important part is that it can't be reversed by a banking authority.
It's all about whether Binance lets them cash out or not, but mixing within BRICS is sure to make it clean enough, as Binance getting/keeping sovereign clients is good for Binance, and not worth appeasing US BS to turn it away.
I'm surprised Elon didn't convince them to take the payments in Dogecoin....
Why would they ever listen to that dumbass, who's involved with the countries attacking them?
That shit only works in white idiots
I heard they are also accepting iTunes gift cards.
Just make sure you don't redeem them
DO NOT REDEEM!!!
WHY DID YOU REDEEEEEEEM!?!?
Bitcoin finely found a use case that's not crime. Take that crypto haters.
Purchasing drugs for yourself shouldn't be a crime, so it's awesome that cryptocurrencies exist for this purpose.
Technically it still is a crime since charging money for access to navigable waters is a violation of international law.
It's not like international law protected them in the first place.
What about Panama Canal, Suez canal, St Lawrence Seaway? Is it fine to charge money for those waters?
They're not natural waterways, somebody had to make them so the law doesn't apply. Same for Great Lakes Waterway.
Besides, international law only applies to you if you agree to it. Both US and Iran do not agree with this.
US also has a law that say US can use military force against the ICC if any US citizen is arrested by the ICC.
That’s not true. Customary international law also applies to states, that are not themselves members of a treaty. In the case of international maritime war and international humanitarian laws this is widely accepted as such.
Maybe that used to be the case but the USA does it different
International law is more like a code of conduct. Also as with most laws, if you’re powerful enough you can ignore the law.
International laws have no meaning if nations don't agree to it.
For example, the United States has laws and policies designed to prevent the arrest of U.S. personnel and its allies by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The 2002 American Service-Members' Protection Act (ASPA) authorizes the US President to use "all means necessary and appropriate" to release U.S. or allied personnel detained by the ICC, often termed the "Hague Invasion Act".
Which law?
This would be the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). It's interesting that the US is among the nations that have never ratified the treaty.
Also, Denmark has a long 500+ year history of charging ships to transit in and out of the Baltic Sea, so this really isn't a new concept (Sound Tolls).
I thought they meant this law but wasn't sure. That treaty has not been ratified by the US, Pissrael and most importantly, Iran! So it doesn't apply and we are talking about a war where neither the invading nations nor the victim nation has signed it.
https://www.simplelaw.blog/p/the-strait-of-hormuz-a-3-minute-international
There used to be hundreds of cases of charges for transit. Led to wars too.
The (non-financial) crime is the best part.
I love taking estrogen I bought offa onion sites :)
Be careful with your sources. Laced drugs are dangerous. But I'm with you.
People who say that crypto has no application are just thinking inside the imperial bubble.
Nobody doubts that ransom is an application for crypto.
protection money, highway robbery
But there are very good reasons why Bitcoin is very far from mass adoption as an actual currency.
The problem is the volatility. It would destroy most people.
People have always known that crypto who is very good for crime.
Crime was the first adopting use, but not the last. Even the US recognizes its value by having a strategic reserve.
That says “proposed” - not implemented, though?
And if it's under Trump's administration, I can't take anything like that as any indication of reason or sustainability.
Trump is part of crime.
This is good for bitcoin.
and so also for Trump
It's ok because the binance CEO guy purchased a pardon in helping Iran laundering their BTC
Richard Teng?
Did they give up using the yuan?
They're doing both.
How could that work? Doesn't it take some time for a bitcoin transaction to get pulled into the chain?
At the size of transactions they'd be doing, it'd probably be worth it to set a high fee so that it gets picked up and processed faster. Should still be peanuts compared to the value of cargo these tankers are carrying
It takes 10 minutes to get a single confirmation, but I'm assuming that it takes more than 10 minutes for a ship to transit this waterway, so it wouldn't matter.
I don't imagine trying to trick Iran out of their money is a particularly good long-term strategy anyway. Nothing unless you're going to turn up in a new ship every time.
Yeah, but the article says they have seconds to pay with bitcoin.
Something tells me the article doesn't understand the way Bitcoin works. A transaction takes 10 minutes to clear on-chain, unless you're using the lightning network, and the lightning network is fucking terrible, especially for high-value transactions like this. Because you can be rug-pulled. That and you can't send high-value transactions on a lightning network because every link in the chain has to have the proper amount of liquidity to make that transaction occur.
The ships can wait, I guess.
A couple minutes?
Yeah, and the article says the shippers are given a couple of seconds to pay in bitcoin.
I mean, all the steps leading up to that take way more than a few seconds, including...getting the email. This seems like someone misspeaking or not understanding what's going on...
Layer 2 networks like the lightning network operated in the milliseconds time frame.
Doesn't that require trust in the provider hosting the off chain transactions? And lightning transactions can get preempted by conflicting moves from a wallet, and invalidated? I'm no expert, but it seems like these big regular transactions would be targets for abuse.
Yes, as far as I understand it. No you create a mutisignature wallet first that holds the funds that can be moved around the layer 2 network.
On chain makes more sense for this application to me too
Haha Trump Coin and Trump retarded model wife coin. Good one.
Wasn't even a "real" coin, just a token on the Solana network
I know, but wasn't "coin" in the name as I recall?
I didn't mean to correct you on the name, just that it doesn't live up to its name
No true, I got it, no offense taken at all. Just curious if I was right about it 😅
Comparing his scamcoin to bitcoin is like comparing Flooz to a Visa gift card.
I just don't get many opportunities to make fun of Flooz 😆
I'd absolutely use crypto if it was more available in anything I'd want to pay for. So far it's mostly just VPNs and donations
People tried that, it failed. It's too volatile.
It's basically a way for people to think they are being sneaky and shit when it's all trackable anyways.
Is it though? Obviously bitcoin, eth, etc. Arent, but xmr and zec would be, no?
Correct. Monero would be untraceable.
To an extent it is but with enough resources and knowhow anything is traceable.
It's not always about direct traceability it's the little bread crumbs that get left by everything. Nothing is absolute and everything we think is secure leaks like a mofo it's just a matter of translating the data.
True, a place like Iran could keep it untraceable, although they would have to take some extra care in order to do so. But for your average person that's not being looked at by a nation state, it is much easier to remain untraceable.
“can't be traced” - it's a public blockchain, though. Everyone can see and trace transactions.
When the money source is clear - it's the shipping companies - you can trace their transactions.
Halal scamming.
Cool, now we can add global extortion to cryptocurrency benefits.
it's a fucking toll you dingus those are iranian waters
No it's not it's an international trade route they're just being Pricks because anything to piss off maga
Those iran's waters. These ships are literally passing through their country, I think you're confused with "territorial waters" as defined in UNCLOS as well but neither Iran nor the US nor pissrael ratified that treaty. Here is a good opinion on why the UNCLOS doesn't really apply
https://www.simplelaw.blog/p/the-strait-of-hormuz-a-3-minute-international
Have you read your link?
yes
International customary law applies even if you’re not a treaty member.
** Iran is right about which rules are universal **
I don't know how much clearer it gets??? Who's gonna argue that UNCLOS is universal anyway? The US or pissrael? Neither of which are party to the UNCLOS and who very much assert authority outside their territorial waters?
International law has no meaning if nations don't participate.
For example, the United States has laws and policies designed to prevent the arrest of U.S. personnel and its allies by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The 2002 American Service-Members' Protection Act (ASPA) authorizes the US President to use "all means necessary and appropriate" to release U.S. or allied personnel detained by the ICC, often termed the "Hague Invasion Act".
Up to 200 nautical miles from the coast is nation's territory.
Can you tell me how wide that straight is and what's on the other side of it so it's contested isn't it
Do they accept Walmart gift cards?
sigh
Why not Monero?
they're uneducated in this regard
Preferred crypto payment is USDT (Thether) stable coin. Which is the least US regulated, and most popular, US $ equivalent/backed stable coin. They are unlikely to refuse bitcoin, though.
A million a ship on avg, high sea piracy is back.
3 to 8 ships have paid in last 72hrs. Normally 320-600ships would have gone thru for free in that window.
I mean... this happened after an illegal war, with probably hundreds of war crimes committed to Iran and hundreds of thousands from israel/US in totality across the region.
This toll is nothing in comparison to that and I prefer this as Iran's form of retaliation compared to more killing.
The strait of hormus does not lie in international waters. What do you mean by "high sea piracy"?
It is considered international for transit passage.
Considered international by people who want to pass through the strait without paying.
A quick google search will give you the history.
It’s considered international by international maritime law. Free passage, freedom of navigation is essential to trade and commerce.
Iran‘s attack on international shipping is a breach of international law and an act of war.
A blockade can be legal under international law, but it’s always an act of war. Demanding a toll to pass means it’s not a legal blockade.
There is no such thing as international law if countries don't agree to it.
For example the United States has laws and policies designed to prevent the arrest of U.S. personnel and its allies by the International Criminal Court (ICC). The 2002 American Service-Members' Protection Act (ASPA) authorizes the US President to use "all means necessary and appropriate" to release U.S. or allied personnel detained by the ICC, often termed the "Hague Invasion Act".
This one? United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)?
As far as I found out neither the US, nor Iran ratified this.
If you want to argue with law you need to have a law which all states involved follow.
Piracy = taking or using something that is not yours.
That doesn't apply here?