How 'assassination marketplaces' were created by decentralized blockchain networks
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- Augur is a website through which people can create prediction markets — or, crowdsourced platforms where people stake cryptocurrency on a prediction's most likely outcome.
- Winners get a payoff while losers part ways with their crypto, either Ethereum or the Augur-specific token "reputation."
- That also makes it a great place for unethical bets — like those that predict whether a celebrity or politician will die this year.
- By betting that a politician won't make it to the end of the year, assassins could profit by ensuring the individual does not make it to the end of the year by killing them.
Right now, there's an online bidding war over whether or not Donald Trump will die before the year is out. All a would-be assassin has to do is stake a whole bunch of money on "yes" and they'd make a fortune.
These not-quite death threats reportedly lodged against the president and other public figures, including Jeff Bezos, John McCain, and Betty White, can be found on Augur, a decentralized app recently launched by the nonprofit Forecast Foundation. Augur is a protocol through which people can create prediction markets, which are crowdsourced platforms where people stake cryptocurrency (in this case Ethereum and the Augur-specific token Reputation) on a prediction's most likely outcome.See the rest of the story at Business Insider
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