Iran Uses Crypto Mining To Lessen Impact of Sanctions, Study Finds (usnews.com) 102
Around 4.5% of all bitcoin mining takes place in Iran, allowing the country to earn hundreds of millions of dollars in cryptocurrencies that can be used to buy imports and lessen the impact of sanctions, a new study has found. At its current level of mining, Iran's bitcoin production would amount to revenues close $1 billion a year, according to figures from blockchain analytics firm Elliptic. Reuters reports: The United States imposes an almost total economic embargo on Iran, including a ban on all imports including those from the country's oil, banking and shipping sectors. While, exact figures are "very challenging to determine," Elliptic estimates are based on data collected from bitcoin miners by the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance up to April 2020, and statements from Iran's state-controlled power generation company in January that up to 600 MW of electricity was being consumed by miners.
"Iran has recognised that bitcoin mining represents an attractive opportunity for a sanctions-hit economy suffering from a shortage of hard cash, but with a surplus of oil and natural gas," the study finds. The electricity being used by miners in Iran would require the equivalent of around 10 million barrels of crude oil each year to generate, around 4% of total Iranian oil exports in 2020, according to the study. "The Iranian state is therefore effectively selling its energy reserves on the global markets, using the Bitcoin mining process to bypass trade embargoes," the study reads. "Iran-based miners are paid directly in Bitcoin, which can then be used to pay for imports - allowing sanctions on payments through Iranian financial institutions to be circumvented."
"Iran has recognised that bitcoin mining represents an attractive opportunity for a sanctions-hit economy suffering from a shortage of hard cash, but with a surplus of oil and natural gas," the study finds. The electricity being used by miners in Iran would require the equivalent of around 10 million barrels of crude oil each year to generate, around 4% of total Iranian oil exports in 2020, according to the study. "The Iranian state is therefore effectively selling its energy reserves on the global markets, using the Bitcoin mining process to bypass trade embargoes," the study reads. "Iran-based miners are paid directly in Bitcoin, which can then be used to pay for imports - allowing sanctions on payments through Iranian financial institutions to be circumvented."
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Good?
They execute people because of their sexual orientation [jpost.com].
The 'mostly peaceful protests' in Minneapolis would have result in executions in Iran [amnesty.org].
Re:Good. (Score:5, Insightful)
They execute people because of their sexual orientation [jpost.com].
They do. But the sanctions are not there to protect gay people.
The sanctions strengthen the hardliners in Iran. They make the situation worse. When Trump abandoned the nuclear deal, he cut the legs off the liberals in Iran working for normalizing relations with the West.
Now the hardliners in both Iran and America are saying, "See, we told you so." But the failures are of their own making.
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Do you have some details on these liberals and the work they were doing?
Re: Good. (Score:2)
Funny. Britain and the U.S. are the source of Islamist terror. Good ironic joke there.
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Good. The sanctions are stupid. If any nation should be allowed to have nuclear weapons (NONE should) then Iran has as much justification as any, given that Israel (also illegally) also has nukes.
The sanctions aren't there to promote some level of fairness. The sanctions are there to impose the will of a large alliance of nations against a nation which isn't part of this alliance. This alliance makes laws which they then consider international law, generally because these laws are in their interest. And one thing within their interest is to have as few nations as possible have nuclear weapons, especially when they are outside of the alliance.
Roughly speaking this alliance considers themselves the "f
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Which alliance is this?
A good chunk of the "free world" has been considering ordering its citizens to do business with Iran.
I guess you must mean the alliance that voted in favour of the most recent sanctions proposal at the UN. That would be the US and... the Dominican Republic.
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"A good chunk of the "free world" has been considering ordering its citizens to do business with Iran."
Huh? How do you order that unless you're in some kind of dictatorship, or communist nation? Got references?
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https://www.politico.eu/articl... [politico.eu]
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"The blocking statute would forbid EU companies, under threat of punishment, to cancel business ties with Iran because of the U.S. sanctions. "
That's a far cry from ordering them to do business with Iran. I only means not cancelling existing business. The purpose being that they want Iran to comply with the original agreement struck up with Obama. Many of us believe that that is only going to delay Iran getting nuclear weapons, and that they should never be allowed to have them...at nearly whatever cost,
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K dude. Whatever you've gotta tell yourself.
You luckyo? (Score:1)
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Show Some Evidence (Score:2)
Israel does not commit apartheid. A policy of apartheid can be applied to a particular group of citizens in a state. Non-citizens can be denied almost any right in a state. For instance, a state has every right to deny entry to a non-citizen. Let us suppose that US denies me entry (I am not a US citizen), does that mean that US is an apartheid state? I cannot legally work in US, is that apartheid for you? Whenever you accuse a state of apartheid, you must be very specific.
There are two kinds of Arab pop
That is 100% Rubbish (Score:1)
Is this your evidence? Oh, man that is yet another lousy attempt to pull the sock of apartheid over the globe of truth. Every time another moron mentions that Wikipedia article, I cannot but laugh my bottoms off.
(Hint: for your ansitemitic toolbox, you have a very much better document: the UN Resolution 3379 [wikipedia.org] that calls Zionism a form of racism and racial discrimination. The resolution was gladly accepted by all the Soviet bloc and probably every Arab
Re: You luckyo? (Score:2)
Ethnic cleansing. Not genocide. The Jews are fine with Muslims existing. But the Zionists refuse to let there be more Muslims than Jews in Israel because then their lies of being a democracy will be exposed.
Re: Iran = IslamoNazi hell, Israel = Land of freed (Score:2)
Of course, until you are Palestinian then you are insect.
Time to export democracy to Iran. Please approve my request to buy your weapons from your tax dollars.
That's why they need nuclear (Score:4, Funny)
A few nuclear power plants could really up their output. Much cleaner than fossil fuel.
Re: That's why they need nuclear (Score:2)
As a thought, why not burn fossil fuel - which they can't really sell - to generate electricity for crypto miners?
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Iran has massive amounts of gas and no available market for it.
If they didn't use it for electricity, they would just have to flare it.
Iran has the lowest electricity prices in the world - less than one US cent per kwh.
Building nukes makes no sense at all.
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My comment was meant as a joke.
Yes, you (and others) are right.
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Building nuclear power plants makes sense as Iran is an oil exporting country. If more of their own domestic electricity is produced from other sources, it leaves more of their fossil fuels free to be exported. This is remedial algebra, not theoretical physics at work here.
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You're assuming they have to do one or the other. There's the third option that you blithely ignore - seal up the wells and don't do anything with the hydrocarbons. Remedial set algebra here, calling on you to do just a little thinking beforehand.
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Or the forth option: fuck off and mind your own business after messing with the entire region for the last century. And when you pay Iran a few trillion in reparations, for the 53' coup, the Shah's dictatorship, backing Iraq when it invaded Iran, the nearly 300 people you murdered when shooting down an Iranian passenger jet in Iranian air space, the thousands more you've murdered with bullshit sanctions - Iran can set up whatever kind of carbon-free economy they want.
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Nuclear is batshit insane. Doesn't change the fact that a nation with dozens of nuclear power plans, and the only one to ever use nuclear weapons has no business telling Iran it can't have nuclear energy.
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Did this Luckyo run over your dog when you were five, or are you in need of a restraining order like Sheldon marching into Stan Lee's house or Sam Seder? [youtube.com]
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Something else makes sense in Iran. Solar power, [wikipedia.org] as well as wind. Less problematic than nuclear for them and the rest of the world.
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I actually hate nuclear power and constantly tell its fans that wind and solar are far cheaper and less risky. But that doesn't change the fact that nuclear energy is a point of pride for Iran and that hypocritical imperialists have no business telling Iran they can't have what the rest of the western world has.
What's problematic is the fact that both the US and Israel have admit
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You don't get to redefine words to mean "terrorist is anyone who resists American hegemony", dumbfuck. There is no definition of terrorism that doesn't place, the UK, Israel, and Saudi Arabia at the top of the list, in that order. Closely followed by the UK and France.
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For the environment, perhaps? Frying the climate makes less sense. Provided they're given the means to build proliferation-resistant nuclear power stations, the risks to world peace are negligible from nuclear power, but considerably greater from fossil fuels.
The idea that they have to sell or burn the fossil fuels, when the alternative is to simply not pump them up from the ground in the first place, is stupid beyond belief. Why would they have to flare it? Because the wells are open? Close them up. Seal t
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Because the wells are open? Close them up. Seal them.
It's not a fiscally-defensible option when they are extracting from the wells for the other products that they are selling. Completely a non-starter; never gonna happen.. so long as they can sell the products for more than the cost of labor and equipment to extract, they won't even consider sealing wells.
The gas comes with that whether they like it or not.. It's too much to just store it all, and releasing it without burning would be MORE harmful to
Umm... about that. (Score:3)
A legitimate use case for crypto.
I don't think "legitimate" is the correct description when you are using cryptocurrency to circumvent laws.
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Doesn't have anything to do with US dollars. 193 c (Score:4, Insightful)
It has nothing to do with US dollars. They can't trade in Canadian dollars or any of the many pesos either. Or exchange for Nike shoes. There are 193 countries that won't trade with Iran until they comply with resolution.
They've simply found a black market - something they can sell without the rest of world's governments being able to stop them, because they don't need to work with any large companies. Any large company, such as Exxon or BP, won't buy their oil. Because then Exxon would be in trouble with 193 countries. But you'll buy their Bitcoin.
The sanctions are UN Security Council Resolution 1737, which was the response when Iran refused to comply with UNSC Resolution 1696 - stop trying to make nuclear weapons.
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The sanctions are UN Security Council Resolution 1737...
I initially read that as "UN Security Council Resolution 1337." Either the fonts are getting smaller or I'm getting older.
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Butthurt Trumpies, please feel free to waste your mod points on me. I have karma to burn. I don't care.
Trump has been out of office for 4 months. He will never hold another political office again. He has all but vanished from the public eye. But for some reason you still fell the need to rage against him in every post by put it in your signature. Have you thought that the problem you currently have isn't with Trump, but with yourself?
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He will never hold another political office again.
This is based on what exactly? You do realize he got more votes than any incumbent president in history, right? Trump may be out of office and out of the public eye, but the GOP's loyalty is still with him. He is the kingmaker and the de facto leader of the party. His voters worship him like the second coming of Christ. Don't believe me? Just go to the comments section of places like Breitbart or Fox News and you can see the veneration. That con-man is still a danger to his country. He spent 4 years attempt
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This is why bitcoin was created.
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1737 only applied to proliferation related products. There are more general embargoes against Iranian energy, shipping, and finance by the US and the EU, but not by the UN IIRC. The EU sanctions on Iranian oil are apparently the most economically significant ones. The prior US administration also attempted to unilaterally sanction foreign companies trading with Iran, but not with UN security council support.
Has EVERYTHING to do with the petrodollar (Score:5, Insightful)
Iran has been willing to trade oil in exchange for currencies other than the USD. That's the entire reason for being placed on the Pentagon's shit list. Along with Iraq, Libya, Syria, Venezuela, Russia...
Willful dumfuckery. Iran remained in compliance even after Trump unilaterally pulled out of the "deal".
Except they weren't, [rawstory.com] you gullible fool. Then explain why Israel, who has 200+ nuclear weapons, isn't being smashed with sanctions, or explain how your head isn't in a warm, dark place.
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I, too, trust the jew-hating, homosexual murdering, genocidal theocracy.
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Iran has one of the largest Jewish communities in the world, dumbfuck. Arabs and Persians have no problems with Jews. They - as would anyone else - have a problem with racist terrorist genocidal colonialist invaders.
Take all your whining, bitching and moaning about Iran's theocracy to the people who destroyed Iran's secular democracy - the US and the UK. Then note how none of your WATB crocodile tears apply to Saudi Arabia, who beheads people in the streets no
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It's always fascinating watching a psycopath trying to gaslight people into believing Iran's innocence, despite the countdown clock to Israel's destruction in downtown Tehran. [independent.co.uk] Animals like you remind me why I carry a gun.
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Boring Zionazi projection. Less than 5% of Palestine was Jewish in 1900, making nearly every last Israeli an invading colonist from Europe, with supermajority European DNA. Out of the last ten thousand years, Palestine has been under Jewish control for a few hundred years, tops. And according to their own fables this is the second time Zionists have invaded and ethnically cleansed the land.
Apartheid Israel is unjustifiable, and all the excuses for it are laughable.
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WTF does Israel have to do with it? Iran is a terrorist nation, that's why.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Does your clown car get good gas milage? There is no definition of terrorism that doesn't place the US and it's lapdogs Israel and Saudi Arabia at the top of the list of the worst terrorist states in the world. As proven by the fact that Iran hasn't attacked another country in 200 years, but has been subjected to terrorism galore from the United States: overthrowing their secular democracy in '53, US support for the Shah who loved to torture dissidents, murdering almost 300 people by shooting down an Irania
Re:Umm... about that. (Score:5, Insightful)
Sanction aren’t laws. What’s legitimate is a matter of opinion.
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As for Iran, on the bright side, it has spurred the Europeans, and others, to start building new global financial systems not controlled by the US. This will take time but is a worthwhile goal.
https://www.dw.com/en/germany-... [dw.com]
Re: Umm... about that. (Score:3)
What laws? You mean the brazen destructive economic warfare imposed on a country by the empire from Washington DC denying the citizens of Iran, Syria, and Venezuela access to such basic necessities like heating oil, food, and medicines?
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Iran is a member of the UN. The sanctions are UN Security Council Resolution 1737, which was the response when Iran refused to comply with UNSC Resolution 1696 - stop trying to make nuclear weapons.
The entire point of sanctions is to make it hurt so that nations will comply. You don't get to break the rules and declare yourself a victim.
Re: Umm... about that. (Score:4)
Except they weren't. As both the CIA and Mossad admitted at the time, Iran had no nuclear weapons program. Americans, got fooled once on WMD's - couldn't wait to get fooled again and again.
But even if they were - how full of shit do you have to be, as the only country to have used nuclear weapons in history (for bullshit reasons) to selectively insist that other countries can't have a nuclear deterrent. Why wasn't Israel being sanctioned to hell and back decades ago along with Iran and North Korea? Pull your head out already.
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But even if they were - how full of shit do you have to be, as the only country to have used nuclear weapons in history (for bullshit reasons) to selectively insist that other countries can't have a nuclear deterrent.
For one, no decision makers involved in dropping those nuclear bombs are alive today. My grandpa was a pretty harsh racist, yet I feel no sense of hypocrisy when I criticize the racism of others. No living American bears any responsibility for the actions of WW2. Americans are free to oppose genocide even though our ancestors were guilty of it, oppose slavery even though are ancestors were guilty of it, and oppose to proliferation of nuclear weapons even though our ancestors developed them.
The United States
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So? France still owes Haiti for forcing former slaves to pay for their own freedom, and that happened long before Hiroshima. Leaders die, but leadership changes hands. The US occupies Japan to this day, and this tangent doesn't explain why America turns a blind eye to Apartheid Israel having 200+ nukes, or has any moral standing to lecture others on this issue.
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They did comply. It is Trump who decided to go Rogue State, along with his pathetic minions.
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Re: Umm... about that. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not the US unilaterally deciding anything.
Actually, it is.
Iran agreed to stop working on nukes and signed an agreement to do so.
Then Trump unilaterally pulled out of the agreement.
Iran kept their end of the deal. America didn't.
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Willful dumbuckery. Iran had no nuclear weapons program and the right to enrich uranium under the NPT to any levels they wanted, so your entire premise is tossed out the window from the start. Then set on fire. And then it was the US who pulled out of the deal, not Iran.
Re: Umm... about that. (Score:3)
Venezuela has no money to buy anything. They stole (nationalized) the oil industry snd ran it into the ground.
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False. [bullionstar.com]
You mean tripling the country's GDP while under overt and covert attacks from the Bush Administration? Even Fox [foxnews.com] was hailing their economy before Obama decided it had to be destroyed to protect the petrodollar.
You western exceptionalists are a million pounds of dumbfuck crammed into a five pound sack.
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Re: Umm... about that. (Score:2)
I dont think Iran, North Korea etx rogue states have 100% of their economies dependent on Bitcoin ! Maybe 10% max.
Meaning 90% of what they import/export clandestinely or through whatever methods is transacted in USD, OIL, Gold, drugs or 20 other currencies.
I can't understand the rabid chant of Ban BTC because of terrorism, ransomware, excessive power consumption....
By that rationale we should ban internet social media like Facebook, which these days only creates problems for users while using up huge energy
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All cryptocurrency use is to circumvent laws. That is its sole purpose. To evade tax, accountability and traceability laws.
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A legitimate use case for crypto.
Here again, any clean energy source being used for crypto mining is energy not available for real industry and consumer application. Furthermore, the coin they produce is too inconvenient, expensive to trade and volatile for legitimate uses. It will either be hoarded or used on the dark web.
I suppose Iran could just sell it. To someone else who will make the same calculations to guide use.
Re: Finally (Score:3)
It would actually be really hard for chain analytics to shut Iran out of selling freshly minted coins. You canâ(TM)t possibly blacklist virgin addresses or virgin coins, so you would have to basically whitelist miners. This is just fundamentally unlike a hack or blackmail where a wallet that is unilaterally deemed âoeguiltyâ can be shunned by exchanges.
Proof of Concept (Score:1)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
In other words (Score:1)
The Iranian state is therefore effectively selling its energy reserves on the global markets, using the Bitcoin mining process to bypass trade embargoes
In other words, bitcoin is a crimecoin.
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Being used for crime is rather different from being solely usable for crime.
Dafuk crimes you talking about? (Score:4, Interesting)
You starting with the US overthrow of Iran's secular democracy in '52, the decades it spent sponsoring the Shah who had a penchant for torture, to shooting down an Iranian passenger get and murdering nearly 300 people, or backing Iraq when it invaded Iran (and gave Saddam intel to use chemical weapons), or assassinating their nuclear scientists, or murdering an Iranian general doing a better job of fighting Al Queda and ISIS than the Pentagon was, or spending more than a decade illegally threatening Iran with military force for a nuclear weapons program the CIA and Mossad know Iran hasn't had....
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Re: Corrupt & Demented Beijing Biden Will Save (Score:4, Informative)
Stop it.
Obama returned money the US govt lawfully seized and refused to return until certain conditions were met. Obama found he could get Iran to sign a non-proliferation deal if Obama simply released their frozen/seized assets. Problem is, Iran was blocked from participating in the US banking system, so Obama had the money converted to paper money (euros and other currencies) to get around the law.
The return of the $150BN to Iran was not a debit paid out of the general budget.
The medium is the message (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: The medium is the message (Score:2)
The problem is that banning bitcoin will only prove its utility to even more people
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Not really. A ban would not be in its use, which would be foolish and pointless, but on the blockchain. Simply split Bitcoin into regional irreconcilable blockchains and it becomes useless.
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Simply split Bitcoin into regional irreconcilable blockchains and it becomes useless.
Why not wish for world peace?
Or more wishes...
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Splitting blockchain is easy.
Makes sense (Score:2)
Iran Finances Terrorist Organisations (Score:1)
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Iran gives missiles and similar to:
- Syria to fire at it's own people
- Hezbollah to fire at Israel
- The Houthis in Yemen to fire into Saudi Arabia's cities
And has fired them as America's forces in Iraq.
Financing terrorism isn't the half of it, people talk about the US being a war monger in the middle east but Iran has literally carried out acts of war against almost everyone in the middle east, it just does so from behind proxies and we let it play that game.
The solution to Iran is to simply make it clear t
Another "Bitcoin is for bad guys" Slashdot article (Score:2)