NSA Developing System to Identify Bitcoin Users

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The US National Security Agency (NSA) is rumored that now they can detect and locate Bitcoin senders and recipients around the world, this is because secret documents provided by Edward Snowden disclose, Intercept reports on March 20.

The NSA manages this by creating a system for harvesting, analyzing and processing raw global Internet traffic, using a program disguised as a popular anonymous software, according to another document published in March 2013.

OAKSTAR and MONKEYROCKET

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Although agencies are interested in monitoring some competing cryptoes, they make Bitcoin the ultimate target.

Tracking is done using a secret internet surveillance program called OAKSTAR, which represents a variety of secret corporate partnerships that allow agents to monitor communications and pull data directly from fiber-optic connections in the form of the Internet.

Services such as VPNs called MONKEYROCKET, the OAKSTAR subprogram, play an important role in identifying Bitcoin users. Instead of hiding user data, MONKEYROCKET taps on network equipment to get data from Europe, Middle East, Asia and South America

In the NSA document, MONKEYROCKET is also described as an "anti-europe internet anonymization service, to support counter-terrorism" launched in the summer of 2012.

In the report mentioned that, There are currently about 16,000 registered users, and this site generates about 2,000 incidents in one day ... Iran and China are two countries with a significant user base.

MONKEYROCKET is governed mainly by the 12333 Executive Order, which extends the authority of US intelligence agencies to investigate US citizens. The NSA's core purpose of the "long-term strategy" for MONKEYROCKET is to be able to attract targets involved in terrorism, to include the security of Al Qaida COMSEC which the NSA can exploit. "

As a result, the NSA collects large amounts of Bitcoin user data, including passwords, browser history, and even their device's MAC address. All of this information is sufficient to identify a particular Bitcoin wallet user.

Just Not Bitcoin

In March 2013, the NSA gave an update on intelligence gathering efforts using MONKEYROCKET, which targets Bitcoin and LibertyReserve, "2 of the top 3 virtual currencies" of their destinations.

LibertyReserve is considered a precursor to Bitcoin, but according to Intercept, it was created with criminal intent. A digital currency service based in costa Rica, LibertyReserve was founded by Arthur Budovsky, who was eventually arrested in connection with a $ 6 billion laundering operation.

Five months after the Liberty Reserve was closed, a US federal agent arrested Ross Ulbricht, the man behind the world's largest black market, Silk Road, where a transaction uses Bitcoin.

The Snowden file does not provide much information as to whether the NSA actually participated in the FBI's Silk Road investigation. However, Ulbricht himself claims that all evidence against him was obtained by the NSA in violation of the Fourth Amendment, and should be considered unacceptable for his trial. The prosecutor dismissed his theory.

Cryptocurrency monitoring by government oversight bodies may be a cause of concern for those who value cryptocurrency because of their unnamed nature and decentralized nature.

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Source: www.coindesk.com/nsa-reportedly-eyes-to-scrap-bitcoins-anonymity