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Hackers steal NFTs worth millions. In other news, NFTs worth millions. (www.theblock.co)
submitted 2 years ago* by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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The way I read the article, the "worth millions" is the sum of the ransom demand.

The funny part is that the exploit is in the "smart" contract, ya know the thing that the blockchain keeps secure by forbidding any updates or patches.

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[–] 21 points 2 years ago* (8 children)

Because sometimes even criminals need to buy things that aren’t illegal, I guess. And the legitimate people who have those things don’t want to play games dealing with fake internet money.

If I want to buy a jetski, the place I buy it from isn’t going to take crypto because the people that sell the parts for it don’t take crypto and the people who build it can’t pay for food in crypto.

Crypto is only useful for rug pull scams, money laundering, and black-market transactions. It’s real innovation is undoing centuries of banking regulations so that people can learn the hard way why all those regulations exist.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago

    Because sometimes even criminals need to buy things that aren’t illegal

    Money has value basically because people need to pay taxes. The shop owner sells things for Euros or USD partially because eventually at the end of the year they need to turn over Euros or USD to the government as taxes. If they sold things for bitcoins, they'd eventually have to convert those bitcoins to USD to pay taxes.

    Other than speculation, the only reason bitcoin has any value is that sometimes people need to pay ransomware ransoms. That means they need to buy bitcoin somehow. And, even the criminals who receive that bitcoin will launder it and change it back into real assets because it's not useful to them as bitcoin. Eliminate ransomware and suddenly the only value for bitcoin is people who hold it hoping there's a greater fool out there who will buy it from them for more than they paid.

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  • [+] -12 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    For now, sure. However, i will say that i have been buying food woth crypto for over a year now and havent starved yet. And if i wanted a jetski and wanted to pay in crypto i could do so. Fundamentally, crypto and banking are two totally different things because with a bank somebody holds your money. With crypto, you hold your money.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    With crypto, you hold your own money

    You own a cryptographic key that a bunch of strangers have decided points to a spot on a ledger. These strangers have no legal connection to you, but things have been working out pretty well so far because your incentives align.

    As a bunch of Ledger owners are finding out, there are reasons for FDIC insurance of banks and that reason is so that people don’t have to be exposed to the dangers of storing all their money under their mattresses. Everyone recommends getting your crypto into a hardwallet, but what happens when a Ledger update bricks it? Or the company decides to backdoor it to escrow your “private” keys? And what can you do with those hardwallet funds besides HODL? Can you imagine if every time you wanted to spend part of your dirty fiat savings, you had to expose all of it to danger to do so?

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  • [+] -7 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    As a bunch of Ledger owners are finding out, there are reasons for FDIC insurance of banks and that reason is so that people don’t have to be exposed to the dangers of storing all their money under their mattresses

    The FDIC is a scam. If JPMorgan or Wells Fargo failed they would not have enough to cover the loss. In fact they only hold ~2% of what they insure which would leave 98% of people with nothing. The only reason the FDIC is not bankrupt is because a cascade of banks have not failed all at once

    what happens when a Ledger update bricks it?

    The recent incident was a software supply chain attack. I am not aware of a bricked update but thats not saying much since i dont follow them closely

    the company decides to backdoor it to escrow your “private” keys?

    You lose all trust in them as you should and no longer use their products.

    what can you do with those hardwallet funds besides HODL?

    That is the point of a hardware wallet to hold your funds securely until you want to use them.

    expose all of it to danger to do so?

    Your hardware wallet acts as savings and use a hot wallet as a spend account with less money in it.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    I’m just saying what I saw over at https://old.reddit.com/r/ledgerwallet/search?q=Lost+my+btc+upgrade&restrict_sr=on&sort=relevance&t=all

    Obviously I haven’t checked up on all of those, but it does seem to happen a bit. I’m not sure how frequently would be considered okay here, but that’s the sort of thing that shouldn’t happen.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    The exchanges are basically cryptos banks. They hold your money, not you.

    And they are much more prone to scamming you than any bank ever could.

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  • [–] -1 points 2 years ago

    They don't hold my money. I use them as they are supposed to be used. I get in, exchange my crypto, and then immediately withdraw it. They are not meant to hold your money. And true crypto people don't let them hold their money.

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