As you were doing your holiday shopping last December 18th, the Hwasong-18 missile was soaring into the upper atmosphere. Experts suggested after analyzing the flight that the North Koreans were testing a payload capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads. Earlier versions of the Hwasong had already been assessed to have the capability of striking any American city with a nuclear warhead launched from North Korea.

Do not be reassured that the US could shoot down the Hwasong-18; we probably could not. Do not be reassured that no one would use nuclear weapons; it takes but the word from the mercurial Kim Jong Un, who has lately been telling his forces to prepare for war.

Wait, isn’t this the same country that just a few years ago was so impoverished and famine-stricken that its people were eating roots? Yes, it is the same benighted land. So, how did they get the money to make nuclear warheads and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs)?

One answer involves cryptocurrency. Crypto-related companies, those issuing the currency, holding it, or clearing it, have been repeatedly raided by North Korean military hackers. In the last two years, these hackers have stolen almost $3 billion, with a B, from almost two dozen crypto firms. Three billion US dollars goes a long way in North Korea, and so could their missiles, carrying their homemade nuclear weapons all the way to any part of the US.

You might then ask, why do crypto companies have such poor cybersecurity? There is, however, a prior question: why are there crypto companies and cryptocurrencies in the first place? Cryptocurrencies have been widely labeled “a solution looking for a problem.” Actually, they are the problem. Not only have they funded nuclear weapons pointed at American cities and controlled by a lunatic dictator, but the process of “creating” crypto requires so much computer processing and electricity that the currency is making a measurable contribution to global climate change.

According to the Biden White House, “As of August 2022, published estimates of the total global electricity usage for crypto-assets are between 120 and 240 billion kilowatt-hours per year, a range that exceeds the total annual electricity usage of many individual countries, such as Argentina or Australia.” The White House statement went on to admit that the crypto generated in the US alone may make it impossible for the United States to meet its international obligations to reduce carbon emissions.

Advocates of crypto currency stress that it offers a way of providing some people who are denied access to traditional banks a way of transacting without involving sovereign entities. Another way of saying that is that crypto allows criminals who cannot use banks to launder money and avoid government scrutiny, which would probably land them in jail. The President could, on his own authority, declare cryptocurrency to be an “unusual and extraordinary threat… to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States” and ban it under the powers invested in him by the International Economic Emergency Powers Act (IEEPA). The SEC likewise has the authority to ban it.

Yet no US Congress, no US Administration, and no independent agency has had the fortitude to take on the “tech bros” and ban this plague. Well, if we cannot ban it for now, might we not at least insist that they have enough security in place to prevent North Korea from funding its nuclear arsenal? Using IEEPA or a variety of other statutory bases, the Administration could regulate crypto to require high levels of cybersecurity to block North Korean hackers.

And if the government is too timorous to even do that, could not the insurance industry refuse to cover theft from any crypto company that lacks high levels of cybersecurity?

The best solution might be to borrow from the environmental playbook and treat crypto breaches like oil spills. Post-Exxon Valdez, every oil tanker operating in US waters must provide proof of insurance coverage for the cost of cleaning up a total loss of the oil they carry. This insurance is purchased from private markets in the form of a bond sold through Lloyd’s of London. To make sure they never have to pay out for the catastrophic costs of an oil cleanup, the insurance syndicates have developed robust certification processes for oil tanker safety.

While we care little for protecting the losses of crypto investors engaged in history’s largest Ponzi scheme by requiring crypto brokers to maintain private insurance for the total loss of their holdings, market forces will be aligned to bring cryptocurrency to a gold standard of cybersecurity. If North Koreans were raiding Fort Knox on a nightly basis to fund their nuclear ambitions, we would demand better security. We must do the same for crypto-holding companies now. Putting the onus on the industry to improve their security by aligning market forces is the most immediately available approach while we wait for government regulators and policy officials to use their existing authorities to act to protect American investors and, dare we say it, American cities in range of North Korean missiles.

https://www.smerconish.com/exc...uclear-threat-to-us/

I tried to read the entire post with a grain of salt, but the big green elephant in the room kept knocking over my salt shaker...

quote:

Originally posted by sigmonkey:
I tried to read the entire post with a grain of salt, but the big green elephant in the room kept knocking over my salt shaker...

That elephant is mobile as hell sigmonkey. He's in my office now doing the same damn thing.

The post seems to be saying the North Koreans are financing their nuclear weapons program by stealing crypto currency and that the United States Government needs to do something. More government is always the answer.

I don’t own crypto currency which I think means I’m not paying for any nuclear threats. As long as the government stays out of it, my taxes won’t be paying for it either. I think I’m good with that.

I remember Walter Cronkite explaining it this way
( Paraphrasing)
For every $100,000,000. Of goods we choose to purchase,
$30,000,000 goes directly to their armed forces .

Since grade school.
No one that's tried to explain our dependence on our enemy's has made the American people look very smart.

quote:

Originally posted by bendable:
I remember Walter Cronkite explaining it this way
( Paraphrasing)
For every $100,000,000. Of goods we choose to purchase,
$30,000,000 goes directly to their armed forces .

Since grade school.
No one that's tried to explain our dependence on our enemy's has made the American people look very smart.

The US doesn't buy any goods from North Korea.

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:
The US doesn't buy any goods from North Korea.

NoKo is China's lap dog.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
The post seems to be saying the North Koreans are financing their nuclear weapons program by stealing crypto currency and that the United States Government needs to do something. More government is always the answer.

I don’t own crypto currency which I think means I’m not paying for any nuclear threats. As long as the government stays out of it, my taxes won’t be paying for it either. I think I’m good with that.

The first obligation of government is to protect it's citizens. You and I have no individual ability to defend against this threat. Therefore it falls to the government. No I am not okay with the North Korean dictator detonating a nuclear device in the United States.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
More government is always the answer.

Would you prefer that they not protect the nation from a foreign nuclear threat?

That wasn’t the point of the article was it?

The point of the article was the government needs to step in and regulate crypto currency and that’s what I addressed.

You’re both putting words in my mouth. Did you read the article?

Watch how it works:
You both think that if the government regulates crypto currency, then the nuclear threat North Korea represents to the United State will be eliminated.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:

The point of the article was the government needs to step in and regulate crypto currency and that’s what I addressed.

I read it until it linked crypto to "measurable" global warming, er, climate change. Hard stop.

The point of the article was to editorialize a hit job on crypto. It was not deeply informative, it was not balanced, it's only goal was the eradication of or complete control over <insert boogeyman of the day>. That I/you/we agree, at least in part, with whatever the words are doesn't make them more valid.

As far as wasted electricity/CO2 output, I'd like to see someone calculate what "journalism" does to the environment.

quote:

The point of the article was to editorialize a hit job on crypto.

Exactly.

quote:

You both think that if the government regulates crypto currency, then the nuclear threat North Korea represents to the United State will be eliminated.

Now you're putting words into my mouth. Where did I say that it would be eliminated? Just like a wall and a physical barrier won't stop ALL illegal immigration. It WILL make it more difficult. Same thing here. By doing nothing to stop or reduce the theft of crypto, we are facilitating our own nuclear tragedy. We are never going to eliminate it completely, but we can reduce the likelihood. And if we don't regulate crypto, how would you suggest we reduce the threat posed by North Korea? Lets see - maybe bomb North Korea and start a war? Or cut off / reduce the source of funding for their nuclear and ICBM programs. I would go with trying to eliminate or reduce the source of funding.

The government tries to do too much, and what it does do (and should do), it needs to do better. I don't see the case for completely ignoring the threat posed by North Korean theft of crypto to fund their nuclear ambitions. All because you are philosophically opposed to regulation?

Sure, the next logical step is a CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency). This of course is a much better idea because of course the evil North Korean boogeymen won’t be able to hack it so our government will be better able to protect us. The ability to track every last thing that we do with our money and simply disappear it or freeze it with the flip of a switch at .gov bureaucrat whim is mere a side benefit.[/sarcasm mode]

Crypto can be crashed like any other fake currency.

It's value is based purely on speculation.

Just another ponzi bubble scam.