Simple, they think money laundering is taking place and the banks are unable to get a cut of it.
Oz bank closes Bitcoin business' bank accounts
The Commonwealth Bank, Australia's largest bank, has closed accounts belonging to Australian Bitcoin payment processor CoinJar. CoinJar, which offers tools to buy or sell Bitcoins, and accept them as payment, has blogged about its experiences. The post says it has experienced some dodgy transactions, but no more than most …
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Thursday 15th August 2013 11:00 GMT Anonymous Coward
CTF regulations
Under CTF (Counter-terrorism Financing) regulations in Australia the bank can be forcibly instructed to close down an account or restrict transactions. When this occurs even the branch staff are not told why. I have first hand experience of this happening (I work in an Australian bank and implemented CTF systems and processes) and this situation sounds like it is one of those cases.
I wouldn't blame the bank for this, the same thing could have happened to NAB, Westpac or ANZ.
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Thursday 15th August 2013 12:25 GMT jubtastic1
Re: CTF regulations
This seems to becoming a thing eh? All your stuff monitored, copied, appropriated or destroyed without oversight, the people that are told to implement action under gagging orders with threats of serious jail time or given no reason why they are doing it, no explanations, no legal recourse.
Secret laws for us to break unaware, i guess its so much easier to run a country when all your citizens are criminals by default and it's only your whim and them keeping their heads down that keeps them out of prison.
I think the thing is that the powers that be can see where we're the world is headed quite clearly, and they're fucking terrified.
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Monday 19th August 2013 14:38 GMT Wzrd1
Re: I smell America's hand
Uh huh, so it's not popular, but the US government doesn't flood the Bitcoin network with tons of rubbish, break the lousy entropy code and flood it with counterfeit bitcoins or anything else.
No, they tell Australia to have one bank close all accounts.
Yep, because shitcoin is suuuuch a threat or even noticed.
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Friday 16th August 2013 08:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
Interesting
Its rather convenient that they fail to mention that Coinjar's co-founder is actually Ryan Zhou or Tong Zhou of Bitcoinica Fame.
You know, that Bitcoin company that got hacked multiple times and left a lot of people out of pocket
http://www.theverge.com/2012/8/10/3233711/second-bitcoin-lawsuit-is-filed-in-california
I personally hope bitcoin continues to grow but with fraudsters like these leeching people, I worry about the genuine people attempting to ensure bitcoin's viability.