Ways to Buy Crypto
Crypto is in the toilet, according to Forbes, but since you’re smart, you want to buy it even more: intelligent investors buy the dip, and your interest is justified by the fact that the world’s best companies are spending billions doing the same. How to do it though?
Shady figure from a dark alleyway
Going the Rogue Nation way has its followers: if you buy Bitcoin from a stranger you’ve never seen before in an off-the-grid location, no-one is going to know, which is what you need if you’re hiding your tracks.
You arrange a meet with a suspicious user with a nickname that reads like a 90s dial-up tag right from the first Matrix who tete-a-tete turns out to call himself Bob The Weightlifter. The place is dimly lit. Some military type with a Foreign Legion tattoo across the alleyway from you seems to be selling sugar to a teenager.
You’re starting to regret your life choices. So we don't recommend it. We certainly don't recommend anything that's illegal.
Buying Bitcoin under the radar
Pros
-
Anonymity
Cons
-
Decidedly unsafe
From a centralized exchange
Did some funny man say something about anonymity? Never mind! The best way to buy Bitcoin is to log on to a large exchange like Coinbase, give up decidedly all of your personal data so it can be passed to numerous intermediaries, government agencies, hackers, Russians, and the black market where it retails at a clearly offensive price of $15. But it’s fast!
Learn more about Top Crypto Exchanges
Just for reference, this is the data you will be giving up when you make the relationship with Coinbase official:
- Marketing and Communications Data
- Referrals
- Survey Responses
- Connected Applications
- Contact Information
- Financial Information
- Transaction History
- Trading Data
- Jod-Related Information
- Nickname
- Date of birth
- and etc. etc... including your home address
and the name of your dog
Buying Bitcoin on centralized exchanges
Pros
- very easy
- exchanges claim it’s uber-safe
Cons
- buying BTC from a stranger in an alleyway is actually safer: exchanges are extremely vulnerable to hacker attacks, sometimes help themselves to your money, and may freeze you out and block your money without as much as a perfumed goodbye letter.
With an exchanger
There is a website on Tilda somewhere on the Internets that offers you to send your money to the requisites it offers, and it promises it'll definitely send you crypto in return.
What could go wrong? Hah.
Buying Bitcoin with an exchanger
Pros
- Actually works surprisingly well, not a single malfunction of any kind in years.
Cons
- Theoretically it's extremely unsafe to send your money to someone with no guarantees.
Learn more How to Store Bitcoin
Using a Telegram bot
You’ve just joined in a discussion on Telegram about the latest Dash developments, which was actually quite helpful. A push-up notification pops up: “I’m the channel admin. Is there anything I can help you with to further answer your questions?”.
Flattered by VIP treatment, you soon tell the “admin” about being new to the business but really wanting to participate in this clearly fantastic new venture.
Sending your credit card details takes less than a minute - and not an hour goes by as the industrious channel user #56729252 has just bet all of your children’s university fund on red in a casino in a country with no extradition and lost. He doesn’t care much either way though, because tomorrow he’ll con another dozen users like you who for some reason think that buying Bitcoins on Telegram is safe.
Buying Bitcoins on Telegram
Pros
- Fast
Cons
- Definitely not safe
Read How to Choose Bitcoin Wallet
Crypto ATM
If there actually was a safe option on this list (and we’re not saying there is) it would be buying crypto using an ATM. It’s pretty legal, machines are pretty reliable, there’s a digital trail you can use to confirm what happened if anything goes wrong. And for those exact reasons we definitely don’t recommend it.
Final thoughts
You’ve probably already figured out where we’re going with this, but just in case: take it from the world’s finest crypto guru Andreas Antnopolous and don’t buy crypto!
Of course this is a joke, the main thing is to think with your head and follow the law.
