Texas Gets Four New Bitcoin ATMs

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If you've investing in bitcoin atm austin texas our video from todayyou've caught a glimpse of the saga that was our attempt to buy investing in bitcoin atm austin texas then subsequently sell a Bitcoin at SXSW. In retrospect, it wasn't a very bright idea. But we were curious, not only of the prospect of using cyptocurrency as a fungible good for making purchases, but also of the promised ability to turn Bitcoin into real cash dollars.

Both of those goals were theoretically possible in that week in Austin, which had hosted a recent Texas Bitcoin Conference --spurring several local businesses read: Austin was also home to one of the first Bitcoin ATM operators in the nation, with no fewer than three places in the city to make automated in-person transactions.

Yes, here was a machine that promised not only to slurp up your dollars to transfer fractions of Bitcoin to your digital wallet, but also let you cash out of virtual currency for Uncle Sam-backed bills.

Something we didn't really explain in the video because we frankly still don't completely understand it ourselves is how the Bitcoin ATM system worked. The ATMs are built by a company called Robocoina Las Vegas-based started founded by two brothers who were previously making Bitcoin-for-cash transactions locally, in person. According to a Wired report, Mark and John Russell, wanted to find a way to automate the process using a machine, while still working within the still-evolving regulatory guidelines set by US government for Investing in bitcoin atm austin texas transactions.

Naturally, they teamed up with a Nevada slot machine maker to start making prototypes. Honestly, the warning signs were all there.

Because of those tricky and still muddy regulatory requirements, Robocoin doesn't actually run its kiosks. Their first customers set up shop in Canada, where Bitcoin trading regulations are more lax--the machine doesn't need identification verification to take or dispense cash. Handlebar was where we ended up buying our Bitcoin, and where I spent the next few days hanging out to try to get it give our money back. It happened like you saw in the video--I had to create an account with the Bitcoin Agents through the Robocoin machine, giving it my telephone number for SMS verificationcreating a PIN, scanning my palm, letting it take my photo, and then also scan a copy of my driver's license.

That's a whole lot of personal information, which in retrospect was pretty stupid of me. Bitcoin Agents holds on to that identification data to comply with government anti-money laundering laws, but there's no promise that they can't be hacked or won't use that information for suspect ventures in the future. Anecdotally, my identity hasn't be stolen yet, but I have received on average one strange telemarketing call a week since signing up for Robocoin--the first of which was from an adult chat service just hours after giving the Robocoin machine investing in bitcoin atm austin texas phone number.

Robocoin operators make money from these fees, which they charge for both buying and selling of Bitcoins. These fees are just one of the sources of controversy regarding Investing in bitcoin atm austin texas ATMs; in Vancouver, the Robocoin operator had to hire a part-time chaperone to watch over the kiosk and prevent other traders from intercepting customers with the promise of lower-cost or free transactions. The biggest hassle was in trying to get our money out from the Robocoin machine, selling the Bitcoin back to Bitcoin Agents.

The process here was incredibly convoluted and opaque. After logging back into the machine with my phone number, PIN, and palmprint, the kiosk spit out a receipt with a QR code representing the wallet address of Bitcoin Agents. The idea was that I would use my wallet to send the Bitcoin value to the operator, with the promise that after investing in bitcoin atm austin texas, the machine would dispense the equivalent in cash--minus the transaction fee. My mistake was in not paying a "miner's fee" after sending the Bitcoin to the operator.

This was a step that wasn't made clear in the selling process, neither by the Robocoin machine or my Blockchain app. The way I understand it now, transactions have to be confirmed by the Bitcoin network, with the data of that transaction being attached to new blocks of data that's generated by the mining process.

The data blocks keep a permanent record of all the transactions taking place in the network, but miners don't have to include your transactions in newly mined blocks.

That's why the miner fee exists--it's a small fraction of a Bitcoin to incentivize miners to attach your transaction to their blockchains and therefore validate it. Merchants and operators typically require the arbitrary number of six confirmations before considering the transaction legit.

And the typical transaction fee So instead of the transaction being investing in bitcoin atm austin texas in the minute average it usually takes, our Bitcoin was lost in limbo for over a day. I sent a support email to Bitcoin Agents, and received a text message the next day they matched my name to my phone number, I assume from Mike Piri, the owner investing in bitcoin atm austin texas the Austin Robocoin machines explaining the situation.

Fortunately, Mike agreed to refund the transaction for exactly what I had sent to the machine, but by that time I was already on a flight back to San Francisco. Was it foolish to give investing in bitcoin atm austin texas much personal information and cash to machine?

Our mistake was not understanding how Bitcoin transactions and confirmations work, and this test was an expensive learning experience. Still, we got a silly video out of it, and it's hopefully a cautionary tale about the risks of Bitcoin and experimental technologies.

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On Thursday afternoon, I bought almost one tenth of a Bitcoin. The entire process was relatively straightforward, required zero technical knowledge, and lasted approximately seven minutes. The bar sits in the heart of downtown Austin, just a couple blocks from the convention center where South by Southwest Interactive Conference is held every year. The festival has long been known as a place to showcase groundbreaking technologies in front of a tech-savvy audience.

First, I entered my phone number. It then texted me a security code. Once I punched in the code, the machine scanned my ID, compared my picture to a photo it took of my face, and then took a scan of my handprint. It then told me to come back in five minutes as it processed my application for an account with Robocoin. While I was waiting, I noticed this guy would be watching over all the Bitcoin transactions:. A few minutes later, I got another text saying I was approved.

I went back to the machine, inserted some cash, held up a QR code with the address of my Bitcoin wallet. Naturally, being inside a bar, I immediately attempted to use my newly acquired virtual currency to buy a beer. And Canada has had its own unit for months. Last October, Robocoin rolled out a similar unit in downtown Vancouver coffee shop. Though every Bitcoin transaction is recorded in a public ledger, called the block chain, that anyone in the world can view, the identity of the people on either side of transactions can remain completely anonymous.

As a result, Bitcoin has became the de rigueur payment system for drug-filled online black markets like the Silk Road , which was shut down after its alleged mastermind was arrested in San Francisco last year. Originally the exclusive province of libertarian-minded technophiles, Bitcoin has quickly grown toward wider adoption—although buying and selling the currency is often viewed as an intimidating challenge for the uninitiated. However, recent moves have started to seriously counteract that perception.

In January, personal finance app Mint announced it would partner with the Bitcoin wallet service Coinbase to allow users to track their Bitcoin holdings just like they would their other investments.

In addition, an increasing number of businesses have started accepting Bitcoin. Most notably, online retailer Overstock. As with many standard ATMs, particularly the ones located in non-bank settings, the owners earn revenue from a small fee applied to each transaction.

One nagging problem for the service, however, are the almost invasive security procedures needed for a new account. Robocoin CEO Jordan Kelly acknowledged that Bitcoin enthusiasts, a group known for putting a high value on privacy, may initially balk at having to scan their IDs and give handprints in order to use the machines. But he insisted Robocoin is going to great lengths to encrypt and secure user data and that these steps are essential in proving to the government that everything is on the up-and-up.

Bitcoin is pseudonymous, not anonymous, and we understand that. If you want to live in a country with some kind of [financial] governance, you have to sacrifice a bit anonymity in order to get Bitcoin. I think Bitcoin is way more important than anonymity.

The process, he said, is about? Robocoin takes the conversion rate from the going rate on exchanges like Bitstamp and Vault of Satoshi. There are a wealth of wholly legal places that accept Bitcoin online, even if adoption in the real world is coming along much more slowly. In Austin, there is only a small handful of locations that will take the virtual currency—a bookstore, a couple food trucks, and a gun shop.

But, as Bitcoin-based companies like Robocoin push Bitcoin out of cyberspace and into the real world, brick-and-mortar adoption is bound to grow. Aaron Sankin is a former Senior Staff Writer at the Daily Dot who covered the intersection of politics, technology, golden retrievers who know how to dunk, organizations adapting to our increasingly connected world, online privacy, the role of dank memes in popular culture, Twitter bots, and that same golden retriever who as it turns out is also pretty good at lacrosse.

He lives in Seattle, Washington and became a reporter at the Center for Investigative Reporting in While I was waiting, I noticed this guy would be watching over all the Bitcoin transactions: Aaron Sankin Aaron Sankin is a former Senior Staff Writer at the Daily Dot who covered the intersection of politics, technology, golden retrievers who know how to dunk, organizations adapting to our increasingly connected world, online privacy, the role of dank memes in popular culture, Twitter bots, and that same golden retriever who as it turns out is also pretty good at lacrosse.

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