In 2008 I was a teenager and an edgy one at that. I was first introduced to game cheats by my brother in grand theft auto 3 right when it came out. My interest for everything tech consumed me quickly due to my autistic tendencies for ingulfing myself into any interest I had at the time. Within a week I learned to deface websites with havij pro, crack youtube account passwords, and hit off peoples internet connections and before long I started to explore the darknet... My interest was in hacking so I joined every blog, thread, and group posts that I could. I wasn't learning anything new so I wanted to find the source of how people discovered exploits from the ground up. That's when I started joining IRC channels. The amount of info I started to receive just as a lurker in their chats could even make the NSA blush today. To make a long story short there was a group of hackers called Invictus which consisted of roughly 15 people. They were discussing a new form of payment like a digital currency that would hold its value in place of fiat currency so that when people were dealing illegal things online they could trade this digital currency that was managed by a system they created called the Broker Operator which exchanged the money for jobs that were being carried out by criminals. tt wasn't long for their idea to take off because the people dont have to deal with real money which was always followed by agencies and they could use there new credit to have other jobs carried out for them in return. But the group had something far more sinister planned as they promised to the people who would use their services that the credit they earn would accrue in interest overtime x10 or more their profit to be exchanged for clean cash later...... IN STEPS.. Bitcoin the first light web digital currency referred to as Crypto where people were incentivized to invest by creating a fixed way to enter whether by directly putting money in or mining it yourself. The group agreed on a new name called Satoshi Nakamoto which will act as this anonymous private entity for logistical purposes. Unfortunately, anyone who was ever involved in Investing into Bitcoin has only been accelerating an ongoing crime market that is thriving now more than ever. So the next time you think you can make your 6 grand into 60 grand just think of the little girl in Brazil that just got snatched into a van because the value of their crime increased enough to make it more likely than not. I'm only now telling this story so much later on out of paranoia to be absolutely certain nothing could trace back to me. And for those that read this and ask themselves well what about other crypto currencies? All a scam just copied and pasted from the original groups idea... Not to say there isn't any value in them but they have way more reasons to just pull your money than the biggest crime ring the world has ever had.