3 ms·

This claim makes no sense. In the real world, crimes have very specific definitions. Most are physical, in fact. For example, robbery is when, with intent to

This claim makes no sense. In the real world, crimes have very specific definitions. Most are physical, in fact. For example, robbery is when, with intent to commit theft, you take property by force. Anything else is not robbery. Theft by taking is: when a person unlawfully takes or, being in lawful possession thereof, unlawfully appropriates any property of another with the intention of depriving him of the property, regardless of the manner in which property is taken or appropriated. (The above is georgia, robbery/theft/etc are state crimes so defintions vary a bit) Again, it requires doing so unlawfully (or converting unlawfully). If doing what this person did isn't unlawful in the real world, it's not theft, it's not robbery, it's not anything. So you have to find a crime that actually matches what happened. It's not wire fraud - that would require " false statement, promise, or misrepresentation in order obtain money or something of value from someone else." etc So what crime do you believe this actually is? (So far i've only seen a civil lawsuit, and while there is a warrant for his arrest, that's for refusing to move the tokens to a neutral third party, or show up to court :P )

notahacker 4y ago
In addition to sounding like textbook embezzlement, I don't think there's any reason to believe that "theft" as define by that very broad Georgia definition couldn't apply here (the "unlawfully" is to exclude certain property appropriations explicitly permitted by law like bailiff seizures or deposit retentions from the definition, not to mean it's not theft if you keep someone's property against their will without breaking any other laws. I don't think it ceases to be "appropriation" of funds simply because you provide something worthless as an exchange either, particularly not with that last clause)
- DannyBee 4y ago
  I will admit have avoided trying to follow the entire rabbit hole of details on this case. So feel free to point out where i've missed some facts. From what i've seen I doubt it would be considered theft for the simple reason that the tokens that were bought/sold didn't belong to anyone else in particular who you could say it was appropriated from. He also paid for all of it, and paid the fair value at the time. In fact, he paid very high prices for the initial tokens (860 times initial value at one point). Then gave away a bunch of tokens. Then waited for an algorithm to do something dumb around the pricing, and then swapped the tokens. Who exactly did he appropriate property from here? He paid for all of it, and paid the prices the market demanded. The algorithm did something dumb, but that is no different than some trading bot algorithm doing something dumb and selling for less than it should, which happens all the time. As for embezzlement, it requires a trust relationship - it's a violation of a fiduciary duty. I don't think he had one? So far, i've not seen any criminal charges here, only civil ones. Certainly prosecutors are slower at this sort of thing, but i'll be interested to see what happens.
  - notahacker 4y ago
    According to the linked article, he contributed code to the exploited contract (and was even paid for it!). That sounds like a trust relationship, and layers of obfuscation around swaps and "paying fair price" arent going to change the fact the intended net effect of the trades was that all the value in the contract was transferred to him. Big difference between a trading bot doing dumb stuff and trading bots using exploits a contractor engineered to cleverly transfer all the assets under management to himself.
    - DannyBee 4y ago
      Yeah, maybe embezzlement then, but still not theft. Depends on what the exact relationship was - most companies go to amazing legal lengths to ensure that they disclaim any relationship between themselves and their contractors. Which is not going to cut in their favor. There have also been plenty of instances of folks much closer to having relationships + knowledge and not being found to be illegal (though rarely there has been civil liability). IE financial advisors exploiting inside knowledge of their clients portfolios + what their companies are up to to make trades that advantage their companies at the expense of their clients. As for the rest - the intended net effect of almost all trades in finance is to cleverly transfer the value of everything you can to yourself ;). The only question is whether he had a relationship that makes that illegal or not.

notahacker 4y ago

In addition to sounding like textbook embezzlement, I don't think there's any reason to believe that "theft" as define by that very broad Georgia definition couldn't apply here (the "unlawfully" is to exclude certain property appropriations explicitly permitted by law like bailiff seizures or deposit retentions from the definition, not to mean it's not theft if you keep someone's property against their will without breaking any other laws. I don't think it ceases to be "appropriation" of funds simply because you provide something worthless as an exchange either, particularly not with that last clause)

DannyBee 4y ago
I will admit have avoided trying to follow the entire rabbit hole of details on this case. So feel free to point out where i've missed some facts. From what i've seen I doubt it would be considered theft for the simple reason that the tokens that were bought/sold didn't belong to anyone else in particular who you could say it was appropriated from. He also paid for all of it, and paid the fair value at the time. In fact, he paid very high prices for the initial tokens (860 times initial value at one point). Then gave away a bunch of tokens. Then waited for an algorithm to do something dumb around the pricing, and then swapped the tokens. Who exactly did he appropriate property from here? He paid for all of it, and paid the prices the market demanded. The algorithm did something dumb, but that is no different than some trading bot algorithm doing something dumb and selling for less than it should, which happens all the time. As for embezzlement, it requires a trust relationship - it's a violation of a fiduciary duty. I don't think he had one? So far, i've not seen any criminal charges here, only civil ones. Certainly prosecutors are slower at this sort of thing, but i'll be interested to see what happens.
- notahacker 4y ago
  According to the linked article, he contributed code to the exploited contract (and was even paid for it!). That sounds like a trust relationship, and layers of obfuscation around swaps and "paying fair price" arent going to change the fact the intended net effect of the trades was that all the value in the contract was transferred to him. Big difference between a trading bot doing dumb stuff and trading bots using exploits a contractor engineered to cleverly transfer all the assets under management to himself.
  - DannyBee 4y ago
    Yeah, maybe embezzlement then, but still not theft. Depends on what the exact relationship was - most companies go to amazing legal lengths to ensure that they disclaim any relationship between themselves and their contractors. Which is not going to cut in their favor. There have also been plenty of instances of folks much closer to having relationships + knowledge and not being found to be illegal (though rarely there has been civil liability). IE financial advisors exploiting inside knowledge of their clients portfolios + what their companies are up to to make trades that advantage their companies at the expense of their clients. As for the rest - the intended net effect of almost all trades in finance is to cleverly transfer the value of everything you can to yourself ;). The only question is whether he had a relationship that makes that illegal or not.