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It seems strange to me that there is a consensus on this site that communications privacy is a human right but that financial privacy is a terrible evil. In fact all of the arguments pro/con (terrorists, drug dealers, etc can benefit from it) are basically identical yet there exists this double standard. The truth is that these now-sacred laws that ended financial privacy really only started being enforced in America in the 80s and their European equivalents in the late 90s. Are we really any safer now than we were then? The proponents of these laws always claim that if only they could close the loopholes they would be successful. First it was bearer shares, then it was "shell banks", then it was money orders, now it's gift cards, luxury real estate, and cryptocurrency. I am skeptical that closing all these supposed loopholes will actually move the needle on crime. As long as you can 10x your money bringing cocaine from Colombia to America or robocalling grandmas, people are going to do it and new reporting requirements or whatever may make them pay 25% for laundering instead of 10% but it won't put them out of business.