Dash Launches SMS Payments Service in Venezuela

Venezuela, a Latin American socialist paradise where people eat zoo animals for lunch and dogs for dinner, is about to experience the warm embrace of the cryptocurrency Dash.

Residents of the great South American country have been using the cryptocurrency for some time now as a result of the massive inflation that has taken hold of their domestic currency.

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In fact, there are now around 2,200 merchants in the country that accept Dash as a form of payment.

Until now, however, the cryptocurrency hasn’t been easily accessible for all Venezuelans.

You see, when you live in a hell hole and have to go out hunting cats for dinner, you may not have access to a smartphone and a solid internet connection.

But thanks to Dash, Venezuelans will no longer have to risk getting shot as they head over to an internet cafe or spend hours waiting for their dial-up internet connection to get them online.

Dash Text

The reason for this is simple – Dash has developed a mobile payments system – Dash Text – that allows you to send and receive the cryptocurrency by SMS.

To sign up, Venezuelans just have to text ‘DASH’ to 22625. After that, they send ‘CREAR’ to the same number and they’ll have a Dash crypto-wallet.

Currently the service is in public beta and can only be accessed by Venezuelan citizens using Movistar and Digitel, two of the country’s major telecom companies.

The service shouldn’t only be useful for people lucky enough to still be living in the socialist paradise.

Venezuelans who were smart enough to leave the country continue to send back remittances – worth around $2 billion a year – to their less fortunate countrymen.

By using that service, they can send money to their family and friends much more quickly. They also won’t have to worry about the money losing all of its value by the time it arrives in Venezuela.

So next time you’re in Venezuela and you think you see someone playing Snake II on their old Nokia 3310, think again – they’re probably just making a payment in Dash.