As if worrying about hackers wasn't enough, there is also another wrinkle that virtual coin investors need to be aware of...
Traveling to and accessing your account from a country that is currently under financial sanctions by the U.S. could be very costly.
A man from the UK recently had to learn this the hard way...
After taking a vacation in the Caribbean Islands, Elliot Smith, a visual effects programmer, was sitting in the airport when he decided to check his Coinbase account.
He logged in to the Coinbase app, no problem. Then he checked his Bitcoin holdings and a few seconds later closed the app.
He didn't make any trades or do any activity on his account, just simply logged in.
Apparently that didn't matter...
When Smith got home and tried to log in to his Coinbase account again, he saw this message:
Ouch!
Talk about a major kick in the groin coming home from vacation.
Cuba/The Caribbean isn't the only one...
Iran, Syria, and North Korea are also not fully in the good graces of the U.S.
According to Drew Hinkes, a partner at Berger Singerman (law firm), this isn't all that surprising.
According to him:
"Regulated entities, especially those in financial services and if they're doing proper OFAC compliance, are going to be looking for virtual currency assets in those nations."
Coinbase is one of the few regulated digital currency exchanges in the U.S. and they have taken great pains to stay in the good graces of regulators judging by some of their prior actions.
The issue still hasn't been resolved yet.
Companies are supposed to get special licenses in order to do business with citizens in countries such as these. The interesting thing about this particular situation is that Smith doesn't even live in Cuba, he was just visiting.
He even told Coinbase as much in a detailed message to their support staff on May 22nd.
A few days later he received this response from Coinbase:
"Having investigated the issue, I am working with a specialist to address it properly. We will follow-up with you as soon as we have an update."
It's been almost 2 months and Smith still hasn't heard back since. During this time he has sent several more requests for updates...
The lack of a response isn't so much of a dig at Coinbase though, but the entire crypto exchange space.
The customer support is terrible with just about every exchange out there. Not to mentioned the wallet issues that Steem owners in particular have had to deal with without much explanation.
In general, all too often customers are just left hanging any time an issue comes up.
This is mostly because of the massive increase in growth the space has experienced over the last 6 months.
Coinbase even admitted as much.
Daniel Romero, the senior vice president of operations at Coinbase had this to say:
"The honest answer is that we've had a tremendous amount of growth, and didn't have enough support staff and compliance staff to handle the amount of requests on the platform."
Specifically, Coinbase as seen a 10x increase in the number of customers using the platform over the last several months according to Romero.
Light at the end of the tunnel?
Coinbase and Romero say they are working on the issue.
On June 2nd, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong outlined how the company would be addressing the situation in Q3 of this year. The plans include committing significant investment towards customer service with a goal of handling most support requests within 6 hours.
In order to make this happen, the plan is to work with an outsourced team to double their support capacity and then also to introduce phone support for their customers.
Coinbase said they plan on doubling their support team again in the next 6 to 8 weeks.
Hopefully Poloniex and some of these other exchanges plan on doing the same because they are undermining confidence in the entire crypto space at a time when it is getting the most face time in it's history.
Stay safe and informed my friends!
Sources:
http://www.coindesk.com/coinbases-cuba-problem-says-bitcoin-business/
Image Sources:
http://destinationvows.com/popular-destinations/caribbean-islands/
http://www.coindesk.com/coinbases-cuba-problem-says-bitcoin-business/
http://www.canadim.com/express-entry-light-end-of-tunnel/
Follow me: @jrcornel
Yep, don't keep your coins on exchanges unless you are planning on making a trade, or in the case of coinbase, want to withdraw funds to your bank account
Don't do it! Get a hardware / paper / brain wallet and be your own bank!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Yes, great advice.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Hell, even keeping your crypto on an application like Exodus would be better than coinbase.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Even if you have ETH or LTC ?? I am preparing an offline wallet to store my BTC in view of August 1st event!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
If you store any coins, (ETH, LTC, BTC, whatever) somewhere online, you don't have any security. Exchanges go out of business, governments shut them down, they get hacked, you name it. If someone other than you has your private keys your money is comprimised
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Not really. Coinbase support has been terrible for at least five years (and likewise the situation is comparable at some other well-known exchanges). The massive growth is just the excuse du jour but if you take a longer term view the underlying problems go deeper than that.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
This has just open my eyes to be so much more vigilant. I visit Cuba often also. Thanks for informing us with this great post.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Yes, it sounds like this is very applicable to you. Be careful!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good to know not to use coinbase :)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Well last time I tried to contact coinbase support for something I got a response that the email support is closed and I need to fill up a form of some sort.. I don't like this platform one bit.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Wow very interesting post @jcornel. I never knew they could actually do that. Poor guy didn't even think he was doing anything wrong.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
waw ...haven't thought about hhis but it seems logic
I don't keep my crypto in coinbase i have it in my ledger but i do have few hundreds of dollars in coinbase that i don't want to lose and also that is the main way to cash my cryptocurrencies to my bank account so i wouldn't want to lose it
thanks for the head ups
resteemed and upvoted
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Once again, the answer to this is simple: Fully decentralised exchanges and wallets. Both exist already for years. But I confess, that people still think they are hard to use. They are not, but the reality is that little use them.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
This happened to me once on Poloniex whenever I used a VPN to log on accidently. (forgot to turn it off) It was a hassle to get everything sorted.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
useful topics. Thanks for sharing.
upvoted...
resteemed.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thank you!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
How about just f**k Coinbase? I mean really, what a bunch of a-holes.
Just use the Bitcoin Unlimited wallet and call it a day.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
haha
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thanks for the informative post. I never liked coinbase and lately with all the problems I have been hearing about them, I will not be using them anytime soon. The only thing I liked about them was the debit card but having access to a Btc ATM and a bitpay card, I am fine with those methods. Can't some companies see that you are using a vpn? Good info, if I go traveling I will be well prepared in advance in regards to my bitcoins :)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Wow. Glad I have never had a problem with coinbase, but goes to show if you had control over your own wallets this wouldn't happen.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
good i love what you are doing
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
This is why you buy a VPN service like Tunnel Bear. Then you can access anywhere with ultimate protection.
www.tunnelbear.com
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
There are just so many landmines out there. The US Treasury Dept locks down an account owned by a UK citizen for accessing his account from Cuba! Yes, Coinbase needs to improve its operations, but talk about being guilty until proven innocent - that sucks!.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Oh man, I regularly check my accounts. Thx man! I don't keep much on the exchange, just the trading funds.
Coinbase has been growing like crazy the last yr or so, in the last 3 months they added 100,000 users
https://cointelegraph.com/news/coinbase-adds-100k-users-in-3-days-irs-loses-ground
I heard somewhere they have no idea how to keep up support..Wonder if they need some contractors to help out ;)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Coinbase has the worse support. It's sad for Mr. Smith that coinbase is actually holding his cryptocurrencies despite all evidence has been given. People must be more careful now when traveling.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Surprisingly Coinbase is actually better than some I have used... cough cough Poloniex (among a couple others)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
The only problem I've had with Poloniex is with Steem and Steem dollars. They can't seem to get that figured out.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
I agree , if you use coinbase or any other exchange its best to put you currency in a hardware wallet and some in a app wallet like Jaxx or such.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
People love coinbase because of the stability of state recognition and hate it for the regulation imposed by state recognition. Use it as a medium of exchange and get out.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
If you coinbase has your bitcoins, then they aren't really yours (they are just entries on a sql database, most likely)!
Even coinbase advise that the customer transfers their funds to their own control/ a different wallet iirc. They explicitly said their purpose is not to be a wallet service.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good point. Thanks for sharing.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
That means even for ETH and LTC, its better to transfer them to an offline wallet ??
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Yeah...I don't think there's anything special about BTC in this regard. They can do 'taint analysis' on all of these currencies (presently).
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
coinbase is a good wallet but i use coinpayments
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Wow, this is good to know. The safe play is to just do a blanket do not access my coinbase account when outside of the U.S.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
I feel for that guy, coinbase is just being unfair and unreliable. I do have an account /wallet with them but since I live in Kenya I cannot buy bitcoin or any crypto . I can receive bitcoin only, ether and litecoin not supported. I stopped using them opting for blockchain.info for my transactions. Lately I have been hearing and reading complains about coinbase, I think its time they upped their game. Thanks for sharing :)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Holy SHIT! I am actually a fan of Coinbase, despite being extremely critical of everything they do. I think they are handling the possible hard fork horribly, and doing something potentially very shady, but I think they largely are trying to avoid coming under any money laundering charges by the US government. They likely do stuff like this as a precaution in that matter. It sucks that it happened, thanks for sharing and pointing this out to us. Coinbase should be used as a gateway to buy and sell bitcoin and move fiat to and from your bank. Store your own coins in your own wallet!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Yes that is exactly why. They need to keep in good standing with US regulators to keep their fiat off-ramps. What are they doing so terribly regarding Bitcoin and the August 1st date in your opinion?
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
They have put out a statement saying outright that if a hard fork occurs, they will not support both blockchains. If you control private keys on one blockchain and a fork occurs, those private keys control the bitcoin on both blockchains, separately. By stating that coinbase won't support both chains, they are effectively saying that they will decide which chain you will have access too. What will they do with their access to the other chain? I do not know, that is left to speculation. All I care about is that if a hard fork occurs, I am in control of my bitcoins on both blockchains.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Upvote and follow me
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Informative piece, thank you. I am from the Caribbean, just to update you, Cuba is the only island in the Caribbean where Bitcoin has a "Legal" status. It does not give it the classification of a currency or commodity. All other islands does not have it under a legal status or recognize it. The Caribbean is quite diverse, this innovation may be welcome in the Dutch Islands but CARICOM islands are long way from recognizing or giving it any status. It may just be in the case of Cuba and not the entire Caribbean. Most folks in the region have never heard of Bitcoin or cryptocurrency but I am trying my best to share the Steemit platform with them
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good information! Thanks for posting it ;)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
It's only going to get worst with time. I feel the use for crypto is growing faster than many of these companies that are playing banks. As for Coinbase as slow as they can be at times I feel they're the only legit company that won't run with your money.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thank you so much, I am going to Mexico at the end of next month and I prefer rather not to check anything now that I now. I am grateful :)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good information!
We must be more attentive, thank you!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
I was all about Coinbase when I first signed up, but after seeing the support issues and pretty steep fees, I am pretty much using them for limited transactions and storing NOTHING on their wallet
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Yes agreed, however, there are only a few off-ramps for turning crypto into fiat... coinbase is still one of the better ones in that regard.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
That is what I use it for :)
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thanks for this important information.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
A very nice post ??
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Well I like what you do
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
If you trust anyone to hold your funds you take a risk.
Offline wallets for long term investments and exchanges you trust for short term.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
I'm keeping all the tokens on stock exchanges for now. But everyone writes that it is not safe. So I seriously thought about it.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Great read i agree. PLZ read 5 Reasons to Sell STEEM DOLLARS @ivylifestyle
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Your follower :), and i like your posts. i see you also vote up ? @ronaldmcatee
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
What kind of news is this? I do not understand at all!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thank you so much for updates !
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Still waiting for my coins to show up in Coinbase... it is my first time buying any crypto and I am anxious to get my wallets funded. Any advice for a newbie is greatly appreciated!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Can't wait to see the new product from Dan Larimer @dan hopefully it will get rid of all these dodgy exchanges. Coinbase hmm!
Check out the EOS project source
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Hi ,,let me introduce myself, I am new here.. I like you.. Pleas vote me. Thank.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
In time these things will be ironed out as clearer regulation come out. This is just another lesson in the importance of controlling your own private keys.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good information @jrcornel. Coinbase closed my account suddenly over a year ago when I was running a faucet. Even though I bought plenty of bitcoin from them, they said it was due to regulations they closed my account and provided no reasonable explanation as to why.
People really need to be aware of what regulations can do to the crypto world, especially businesses involved that can centralize it to an extent. Use at your own risk.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Wet nice blog. This is good information to know and I will keep this in mind as I plan to travel and see the world. @jrcornel you rock for providing this information as I'm a coinbase user and had no idea of this before your post. Keep on steeming.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
If only coin base wasn't so slow, it would be easier to get my money out x'D
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thank you for bringing this to our knowledge!
I do have a question though, do these sanctions also apply to non-US citizens?
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Another reason why the government fucking sucks.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Well I have to differ with you on that, you will thank your government(US), if you compare what other governments are doing to their citizens.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
As if Coinbase needed yet another reason to screw with your account!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Great info dude, thank you.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Congratulations @jrcornel! You have completed some achievement on Steemit and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
Click on any badge to view your own Board of Honor on SteemitBoard.
For more information about SteemitBoard, click here
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPDownvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
the lesson of the story? never access your financial stuff with free wifi
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Hi, I´m a robot, I just upvoted you! I found content that might give others more insight about your topic:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurashin/2016/12/20/hackers-have-stolen-millions-of-dollars-in-bitcoin-using-only-phone-numbers/#2c3c1e2438ba
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
very informative
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thank you for the warning. Live and learn!
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Great Post, Really helpful one. I request you to keep write more.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thx for your post. This realy needs to be put to peoples attention! I wrote a post on this 6 days ago from personal experience. Account locked 🔒 Feel free to have a look. https://steemit.com/cryptocurrency/@bigb123/warning-coinbase-users-think-twice-before-you-travel-to-cuba
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Thanks for sharing the info. I was thinking of transferring my Steem dollars to my bittrex account but i guess its not safe to hold you coins and money. Many of the currency exchanges and online wallets are now hacked daily and Millions of dollars are lost.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Really? Glad I saw this. Thanks for alerting people. Though Coinbase shouldn't take any actions but verify the frequency of logins coming outside the countries which have been allowed. Though I am glad they are at least asking for proof of address and haven't shut down that poor guys account. That's the reason hold it offline and keep minor investment in the exchanges. You never know for what reason the hard earned money would be confiscated. Hardware/Paper wallets is the way to go...
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Very interesting, this also goes for using coinbase via a VPN, my flat mate had his account frozen after trying to login to coinbase at work who have a VPN in place, the country used must have created notification, it must have been on the naughty list?
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit
Good luck getting any timely response from Coinbase. I'm outta there now, likely forever.
Downvoting a post can decrease pending rewards and make it less visible. Common reasons:
Submit