By Xeno

Global, private and untraceable, it’s the monetary system of choice for libertarians, geeks, businesspeople and, apparently, drug kingpins

Earlier this week, two senators sent a letter to the US Attorney General, copied to the Drugs Enforcement Agency, alerting them to the existence of an underground website called Silk Road. Like a lawless eBay, Silk Road users can, according to the senators, “freely purchase and sell illegal drugs . . . from cocaine and heroin, to ecstasy and marijuana”. For this they are using the digital currency Bitcoin.

Created in 2009 by an anonymous Japanese computer science student using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin was initially adopted by hackers as a means of bartering services. Now it is fast becoming the unofficial... More...