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by giantrobot 1666 days ago
People living under a corrupt government and experiencing hyperinflation are no safer or necessarily better off with cryptocurrency. Conducting cryptocurrency transactions requires a non-trivial amount of infrastructure. Even "offline" transactions with a Rube Goldbergian number of mesh network components needs all those components to work.

A fortune in Bitcoin in a conflict/disaster zone is no more useful than a fortune in dollars in a bank if you can't access it readily. Your fortune means shit if you can't buy a loaf of bread.

Even if you can access the infrastructure necessary to spend cryptocurrency to buy a loaf of bread they provide no protection against localized inflation. Prices of goods in a conflict zone increase significantly due to dangers/difficulty associated with the supply chain or lack thereof. Sometimes they increase due simply to greed. Transacting in a cryptocurrency doesn't help at all with this. Your Bitcoin fortune can be wiped out just feeding your family since your only other option is to starve to death.