Am 20.01.2014 um 00:49 schrieb Christopher Ahrens: > Mark Schneider wrote: >> Thanks for your suggestions Ryan. >> >> On 18.01.2014 02:59, Ryan Kirk wrote: >>> >>> What is the point of a Swiss bank account? Especially with FATCA? >>> OpenBSD has a nonprofit foundation behind it which looks a lot better >>> than funneling money through tax havens. >>> >> Swiss bank accounts are the most safe worldwide. >> Some donating people want to stay anonymous so it is neccessary to ofer >> them such posibility. >> Further it is rather difficult (in particular for foreign secret service >> agancies) to monitor payments and/or to block money of nonprofit >> fundations when the account is just in a neutral country like Switzerland. >> > > The NSA was able to bug Merkle's phone, I don't think they have a > problem with Swiss bank accounts. Besides, who many people out there > would be embarrassed by donating to OpenBSD? If they are trying to > stay anonymous, they could always use BitCoin; setting up a Swiss > account will only cause MI6/FSB/NSA/CIA to follow Theo and the rest of > the foundation so close they know what they ate for breakfast... > Beside that, do you even know what the fees are on numbered accounts? > Silence and anonymity isn't cheap.
Yes, I think so, too. Hiding something from the tax authorities or some local government will be very different from hiding something from NSA/MI6 or data provided by one of their affiliate organizations. If the powerful wanted no more tax evasion I believe there would not be any; US and GB secret service would have the power to do so (BND alone f.i. does of course not have it; it had to buy bank data records.). Someone who can controls bank transfers who can detect hard cash by sensors and who has vast conventional and progressive resources could very likely achieve this goal without a major problem. I just wonder where Obamas announcement to do so has vanished.
