[e-gold-list] FUD for thought

[Tril]

Here's some e-gold FUD in an article about Internet crime and
security.  Perhaps the author needs a meeting with a clue bat stamped
with the URL to Douglas Jackson's blog...

At
http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/October/oct15_internetblackmarkets.shtml
a FUD author whose e-mail address is at the top of the article wrote:

> Money generally changes hands through non-bank payment services such
> as e-gold, making the criminals difficult to track.

I found this article via
http://it.slashdot.org/it/07/10/16/176255.shtml

Tril's response to FUD:

I think the author would be wise to add a "think they are" in between
"criminals" and "difficult to track", for a more accurate statement.
E-gold maintains a complete history of every transaction, accessible
to law enforcement on presentment of a valid court order.  E-gold's
secret anti-fraud techniques involving mining their own database,
developed on their own to protect their own interests, ensure that
using e-gold for criminal activity is much more risky to the criminal
than using a bank.

In spite of the lack of stringent identification requirements to open
an e-gold account, e-gold's anti-fraud practices are sound.  In order
to use stolen e-gold, it must be transferred ("spent") to another
account, in return for goods or services.  By following the permanent
digital trail of e-gold spends (including the IP addresses,
transaction history, and up-to-date contact information required to
prove ownership of an e-gold account) to the non-digital world,
criminals can be easily apprehended.  In fact, e-gold's willingness to
provide tips to law enforcement has resulted in retaliation on more
than one occasion.

E-gold routinely monitors transactions and limits incoming spends to
accounts that exhibit activity matching patterns consistent with known
criminal activity.  It is highly likely, therefore, that e-gold is
responsible for preventing the sale of many stolen credit card
numbers, inadvertently helping the banking industry.  Smart criminals
would use credit cards to buy credit card numbers, if they could find
a foolish criminal to accept them.  Meanwhile, smart criminals demand
payment in e-gold, demonstrating that they prefer to use a system that
is harder to exploit than the one they live off the weaknesses of.

Cheers,

Tril


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