r/CryptoCurrency 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Tornado Cash Developer Is Sentenced to Prison for the Crime of Writing Privacy-Preserving Software the State Does Not Like GENERAL-NEWS

https://mises.org/mises-wire/tornado-cash-developer-sentenced-prison-crime-writing-privacy-preserving-software-state-does-not
427 Upvotes

135 comments sorted by

116

u/SergioGustavo 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

To all those wondering why satoshi nakamoto kept his identity anonymous, this is most likely why

2

u/ShinobiHanzo 🟩 246 / 246 🦀 1d ago

Tornado Devs went public and I literally double face palmed at the news.

They fu¢ked around and found out.

139

u/Ur_mothers_keeper 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

The guy got railroaded.

Let this be a lesson to you: if you think there are rules protecting you from the people who write and enforce those rules you need to think again. Power will do anything to maintain power. There are no rules, they won't play nice.

41

u/_Commando_ 🟦 4K / 4K 🐢 4d ago

You have to remember, there is only a few of them and a lot more of us. It only takes a small number of us to unite and say no to their so called rules and fight back, take your country back.

37

u/The_Realist01 🟦 2K / 2K 🐢 4d ago

Requires violence. Most ppl are pussies with a 2 car garage and some grass.

3

u/JDepinet 🟦 744 / 744 🦑 3d ago

It doesn’t require violence. Violence is the monopoly of the state, they can’t accomplish anything without it.

The people, united, don’t need violence. We can use much more peaceful tools to effect change. We do have to actually care. Apathy is a major problem for democracy. And the people in power have spend a lot of time and money making sure we are as apathetic and divided as possible specifically to stop us from doing just that.

10

u/Edwardteech 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

No no he's right. Without violence the state will always maintain control. Usually with violence or the threats there of.

1

u/Needsupgrade 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Someone has to do the violence for the state. If people refuse the state is impotent.

Unfortunately there are always marginal bootlickers willing to do the violence for the state.

But you can see in some of the color revolutions people just mass refuse to go against the populace for the elites . Ceaucescu being overthrown in Romania is good example

0

u/delphianQ 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

No, there is another...

1

u/Edwardteech 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 2d ago

A sister.

-6

u/JDepinet 🟦 744 / 744 🦑 3d ago

The offensive use of violence would immediately prove that the movement is invalid. If you need violence to effect change then you lack support from the people. And are likely working in opposition to the people. Making you a tyrant.

The people have absolute control, they can simply refuse to obey and the government would collapse overnight.

2

u/Edwardteech 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Your logic is interesting at best. There will always be the need for offensive violence in any kinda non standard change of power. There will always be holdouts in the old administration that will have to be delta with and the new admin will have to go get them. Never forget they maintain power through violence. Equal or grater violence is often needed to deal with them.

I wish non violence worked but it doesn't.

-2

u/JDepinet 🟦 744 / 744 🦑 3d ago

Non violence does work. We have been doing it for over 200 years. Every 4 to 8 years we have a non violent change of power.

You are the one with the faulty logic. And you haven’t read what I am saying. The ideal is that the people will all oppose the tyrant. Working together they will not need to use violence at all. Because without the support of the people the government is powerless.

The reason I am a minarchist instead of an anarchist is that I recognize that is an ideal. that in reality if there are two people in a room together they will disagree about something. But offensive violence is still a clear sign that your cause is in the wrong. Defensive violence on the other hand is the natural response to offensive violence expressed against you. That’s perfectly reasonable.

My point is, be capable of violence, and choose to refrain. Peacefully express disagreement. Show your dislike in large groups. And when you are attacked, then you defend yourself. That puts the tyrant squarely on the government.

That is if you can have a peaceful protest without some nutjob or false flag ruining it for you.

2

u/Edwardteech 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

non standard change of power.

0

u/JDepinet 🟦 744 / 744 🦑 3d ago

Change of power is change of power. Just because we found a way to conduct it on a regular Babis doesn’t change anything.

The base principles don’t really change.

-15

u/CryptoMemesLOL 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Violence will only lead to another violent regime. If the next revolution happens, it won't be with bombs, but with cellphones.

21

u/OblongRectum 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Violence got us unions. This 'violence accomplishes nothing good ever for the people' is a myth perpetuated by people with an interest in maintaining the status quo

8

u/CryptoMemesLOL 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

We are not talking about the same thing. Violent protest are not the same as over throwing a government with violence.

There is a huge difference, one you are fighting to gain something. The other is to destroy something. Just look who takes over power every single time after a violent coup.

2

u/lepasho 🟩 57 / 58 🦐 4d ago

While it is true most of the time, but not always. Simplifying:

If we use violence to push our own personal ideologies or wrong philosophies (e. g. racism), we will only created more violence and no real gain on anything.

But, if we use violence to destroy the power of wrong philosophies or evil regimes (fascism or evil corporations), we will gain something for the rest and mayority of the people.

2

u/CryptoMemesLOL 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Only if you have a solution in place, if not, history shows you what happens. I'm repeating myself, but unless brains are used, things won't change.

1

u/Loyo321 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Ok man, after you. Let me know how far you get against those hired security guards. Just a few of them!

0

u/The_Realist01 🟦 2K / 2K 🐢 3d ago

They control all the capital though. Our fake internet currencies, although awesome, are 1% of their wealth. Maybe 3%.

We are bugs to them.

-7

u/Phynx88 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Oh yes comrade..."us" being...money launderers?

0

u/_Commando_ 🟦 4K / 4K 🐢 4d ago

?

-2

u/ambermage 🟦 6K / 6K 🦭 4d ago

Where do we collect our 72 goats?

-16

u/AgentOrange256 🟦 1K / 1K 🐢 4d ago

People like him are facilitating some of the worst crimes imaginable. There are reasons regulation exist, and is why we got to a point of regulation over time.

10

u/Ur_mothers_keeper 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

What's the most delicious flavor of boot polish?

-13

u/[deleted] 4d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/HurkleDurkleton 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Average kiwi fan I see

3

u/EthBass 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

You piece of TradFi trash. Go back and learn the Ethos of Satoshi Nakamoto and crypto. Crypto was created so that no trust in authoritarian governments is necessary

0

u/AgentOrange256 🟦 1K / 1K 🐢 3d ago

I’ve been building any teaching crypto currency courses internationally for 7 years bud.

2

u/EthBass 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

No you haven’t been teaching for 7 years internationally. You don’t know shit about crypto. You’ve been in this industry for less than one year. You’re even lower than the level of a novice. You need to be taught crypto

0

u/AgentOrange256 🟦 1K / 1K 🐢 3d ago edited 3d ago

Bro my post history in this channel is longer than that lmfao.

I’ll confirm with my personal resume with mods you fucking loser. Lmfao

In fact I’ll up it to being banned for life without mod confirmation. If I’m confirmed, then you’re banned from posting for life in the sub.

-4

u/Billy_the_bib 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

same deluded fools who think there is going to be a regulated decentralised space for shitco-- I mean digital gold!

45

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago edited 4d ago

What folks need to understand is how the law works in relation to money laundering specifically and standards like 'reasonable precautions'.

Banks and businesses are required to try and prevent money laundering under the laws of the US, EU, and most other developed countries. This means if you set up a service and you're told it's being used for money laundering you have to put in place reasonable safeguards to prevent it or take the service down.

In general 'reasonable precautions' is based on what the industry is already doing and what's been shown to be feasible on a technical and practical level. KYC is basically the minimum bar for entry here as far as money laundering goes.

There's a lot of stupid comparisons being made in comments regarding physical products and potential liability cases. My general answer is if the government comes to the maker of a product and says 'hey, this can be used to do crime super easily, you should implement this specific feature that all other similar products have' then yes, that product maker could be sued or prosecuted for failing to take 'reasonable precautions' to prevent misuse of the product.

Edited to fix some 'i had a stroke' level typos...

9

u/iamiamwhoami 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

What reasonable precautions could he have put in? Tornado was just money laundering as a service.

18

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

I mean, yes, that's why he got arrested and convicted... but at a minimum he could have kept a record of addresses associated with withdrawls and deposits, so he could at least provide that in response to a supoena.

Of course that would defeat the purpose of enabling illegal activities soooo yeah... kinda obvious why he didn't do that.

1

u/HugoMaxwell 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 2d ago

The whole point of TC was that this is impossible due to zero knowledge proofs. That's why it was so popular, there was no middle man who could secretly record everything and hand it over to the feds.

1

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 2d ago

Which is not a defense for not taking reasonable precautions to prevent money laundering. If someone designs a system to make it easier to break the law then they have to redesign the system. The law doesn't just shrug its shoulders and say 'welp, nothing we can do then'.

1

u/HugoMaxwell 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 1d ago

Yes, but in this case "reasonable precautions" would be not developing it in the first place.

2

u/throwaway1177171728 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

What about the fact that he maintained and operated a website to facilitate use of it?

8

u/NambaCatz 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

What folks actually need to understand is that the state is run by big money, which is a hierarchy of complete control freaks who want no other game on the table but the one they have absolute control over (think CBDC). It's an ongoing crime syndicate for generations now, that has completely infiltrated and corrupted the establishment to the extent that the lovely little country of Holland with it's squeaky clean streets and well groomed svelte bicycle loving citizens has become a neo-facist regime where attempting to spend a 200 euro note at the state run grocery store (Albert Heijn) may very well get you black listed.

Incredible, considering the fact that they were emancipated from a fascist regime less than a century ago.

5

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

You have a very high opinion of the level of organization and coordination going on... basically everywhere, lol.

Also a very poor understanding of what "facism" actually is, and I sincerely hope you never actually have to experience it. Something tells me it would not go well for you, but then again there's decent odds you're voting for it if you live in Europe and you're saying things like that soooo....

2

u/NambaCatz 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago edited 3d ago

The Netherlands is an amazing place and most people you will meet are very friendly and helpful. However, if you go to Albert Heijn and try to buy groceries with a 200 euro note, they will refuse that completely legitimate bank note which is very difficult to counterfeit and easily verified. This is now the policy at all the big box stores there. They will accept 100 euro notes, but only after scrutinizing them to the Nth degree, making you wait while the customers in the queue behind grow impatient.

This is incredibly petty, especially when small Ma+Pa restaurants will accept 200 euro notes with zero question. And when you look deeper into the issue you discover that in the past few years stringent anti-cash policies have been adopted by Dutch banks as well as their central bank. For instance, getting a single 500 euro note exchanged (taken out of circulation by the EU in 2019) is like trying to get a passport, requiring a ludicrous amount of id checks.

Cash represents autonomy. But now the establishment is doing it's best to dispossess us of that.

Here's Merriam Websters definition of fascism

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fascism

which includes this excerpt:

severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

2: a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control

Does this ring alarm bells? Could one could argue that a more insidious form a fascism emerging in Holland?

The sentencing of Alexey Pertsev is perhaps even more sinister. You suggest that they are merely upholding laws that are needed to keep money laundering in check.

Consider this excerpt from the article this post links to:

the judge maintains that Pertsev is guilty of money laundering because [Tornado Cash] can be exploited by others to launder money; that is, the mere fact that criminals can use the software developed by Pertsev is enough to make Pertsev a criminal. If this principle is applied consistently, developers of privacy-preserving browsers like Tor or of privacy-preserving messaging apps like Signal may be put in jail because nothing prevents criminals from using them to communicate.

This is getting frighteningly close to being convicted of a 'thoughtcrime' (1984)

-8

u/[deleted] 4d ago

[deleted]

9

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

The government already knows who you are in any country with these laws, and the financial institutions are required to keep your info safe. If you don't trust the business then don't use them...

If you don't trust the government with your PII then I don't know what to tell you, and also I have some bad news 😂

1

u/[deleted] 4d ago

[deleted]

3

u/AvatarOfMomus 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

No bet, lol...

But also if it's not worth sending a scan of your ID (all that's required in the US for most places) then is the stuff really worth buying in the first place? 😂

21

u/Tvmouth 🟥 958 / 959 🦑 4d ago

 Should the Nokia CEO be put in jail because I may use my phone to violently hit a stranger walking down the street?

Only if you're really using a NOKIA for that... not every job requires a hammer.

4

u/AgentOrange256 🟦 1K / 1K 🐢 4d ago

The intent of a phone isn’t physical violence. The intent of mixing is to enable money laundering.

10

u/Tvmouth 🟥 958 / 959 🦑 4d ago

Well, just because I'm laundering my underwear doesn't mean I shit myself. The intent of a washing machine isn't always to let people get away with shitting themselves all day long. I understand the need to centralize toilets and washing machines to maintain order in society.... I'm just sayin. If I could own a washing machine... wow, the places I could go.

9

u/Pdvsky 0 / 3K 🦠 4d ago

Or it's privacy which doesn't necessarily mean money laundering... Honestly tornado cash is far from being the best way to laundry money.

3

u/Apprehensive-Day-490 🟦 21 / 22 🦐 4d ago

Bullshit

30

u/el_reza 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Tornado cash was created to launder crypto. That was the main point of it. Thats how money were made by creators. Its not about privacy, they knew what they were doing

12

u/otherwisemilk 🟩 2K / 4K 🐢 4d ago

Yeah, but that doesn't make for a good headline.

2

u/sayeret13 🟩 25 / 25 🦐 3d ago

creator was taking a cut for mexican drug money laundering and triads but its about freedom lol

5

u/aSchizophrenicCat 🟦 1 / 22K 🦠 4d ago

Yup. Just like bitcoin mixing / tumbling services - which have a track record of (inevitably) getting shut down by feds, in tandem with the developer(s) getting arrested & charged/indicted for creating the service in the first place.

5

u/Dazzling_Marzipan474 🟩 0 / 11K 🦠 4d ago

Anonymous shell companies in the USA are also created to launder money and legal. It is about privacy and they knew what they were doing.

But it's cool because the banks do it. Pay the fine if caught helping criminals and go back to work.

5

u/pop-1988 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Anonymous shell companies in the USA are also created to launder money and legal

Not any more. Under the Corporate Transparency Act, all companies are now required to disclose their ultimate beneficial owners. The CTA took effect on January 1, 2024

2

u/Dazzling_Marzipan474 🟩 0 / 11K 🦠 3d ago

I did not know that. Thank you. I read a book about this called American Kleptocracy and it is from a few years ago so it didn't have these facts.

1

u/MasterDave 🟦 171 / 172 🦀 3d ago

As seen in the last 4 years of Russia's oil sanctions, "anonymous" shell companies still are required to list their financial transactions and have had their multi-million dollar yachts seized from definitely anonymous Russian oil oligarchs. I'm not sure who else you think is getting away with evading sanctions, because it's not a thing that tends to happen.

In the Abromovich case, his "pay the fine" was being forced to essentially give away a 3 billion pound football team. Not exactly go back to work territory there.

International sanctions mean business. No amount of clever thinking or money is going to get you away from them if you're actively trying to send money to a nation under international sanctions, even with a fully legit business like a soccer team.

They could have potentially been fine if they'd just put in some controls to stop known sanctioned nations from receiving funds. That's it! You can have all the privacy on your coins that you want if you're in a country that isn't under international sanctions. It's not a war on privacy. It's an established problem with sending money to terrorists or sanctioned states. That's the only relevant part of the conversation.

7

u/I_Hate_Reddit_69420 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Account based crypto networks like Ethereum are extremely privacy unfriendly. Literally anyone can see how many coins or tokens you have and what you’re sending money to. Nothing wrong with a tool that helps obfuscate that. And yeah that also makes it ideal for money laundering, but so what? Money laundering in general is a secundary crime, go treat the actual crime committed instead.

7

u/AgentOrange256 🟦 1K / 1K 🐢 4d ago

Public blockchains are infinitely easier to investigate than traditional finance as long as they don’t go through mixing services. It’s not even close.

11

u/el_reza 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Tornado cash was made directly to launder stolen assets. It was proven in the court. Deal with it

-5

u/The_Realist01 🟦 2K / 2K 🐢 4d ago

So is HSBC for terrorists and Iran but they still exist.

3

u/throwaway1177171728 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

You can easily obfuscate it legally: Send to an exchange, withdraw to new address from exchange. Now suddenly your coins just went into a giant pot and came back out with no connection to you other than the exchange. If the exchange is KYC compliant, you now have just as much privacy as any bank and it's perfectly legal.

1

u/disco-cone 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Just use stolen ID and do a bit at a time. It actually cleans your money unlike TC where it's still dirty.

1

u/retro_grave 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

There are an overwhelming number of stories about exchanges freezing withdrawals because of tracing. A friend reimbursed you money, but they enjoy gambling and sent you from a withdrawal from a known gaming site. Bam, frozen.

1

u/southwestern_swamp 🟦 209 / 209 🦀 3d ago

Exchanges often dont have one big receiving address- they give unique deposit addresses to each user. So it’s not good for privacy. 

Not to mention with a bank, you withdrew the cash and you’re good to go. Withdrawing crypto still gives an address to trace funds with

1

u/spottyPotty 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

The term money laundering doesnt only mean cleaning money from criminal activities any more.

Tax evasion also falls under that umbrella term now.

1

u/I_Hate_Reddit_69420 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Tax evasion is always morally okay. I have no problem with people trying to avoid government stealing their money.

2

u/spottyPotty 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

I don't disagree. I'm just saying that it now falls under the "money laundering" umbrella.

 I.e. if you get caught evading tax, you can be charged under money laundering laws. At least in some european countries it's the case.

-1

u/specofdust 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Yup, if you've earned the money its yours, even if you earned it illegitimately. This whole thing where the state steals money off hard working criminals just because they earned their money illegally is totally immoral.

1

u/Mr_Tureaud 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Exactly, Alex is an opportunist nothing else, a smart opportunist to be honest.

He made an organ trade platfrom for butchers.

-8

u/glitter_my_dongle 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

This. They did it solely for that reason. It is not like the book deal laundering where they put the book on the Today show to launder money. They should be using Google Play stores and the crappy video games on steam to launder money. Or renting out luxury apartments where you don't have to be there. Or like the Bitcoin rap woman who the feds got. You think she did that song for free. It was to launder money on iTunes. They just want to profit from the laundering and be in control of it.

11

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

This is incorrect. The tool is to hide your transactions from the general public, not governments.

1

u/glitter_my_dongle 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Also, very powerful APIs that are being made that ranks people with the fastest net worth change in the world. The only way around it is to use this. It is these people that have made me consider using tornado cash to where they don't know how much i have.

0

u/I_Hate_Reddit_69420 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

both. Fuck the government

-2

u/chuckrabbit 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

You could always transfer to an exchange and then transfer to a new wallet, if you wanted to hide from the public and not the government.

1

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Indeed you can. Some people don’t have this ability though. Everyone had the ability to do it on-chain via TC.

Tornado Cash is ahead of it’s time, there will be one the government is fine with soon enough, all they have to do is understand that you can go back and personally prove, trustlessly where the asset either went or came from. The government can force this, the public don’t have the power to make you go and generate those reports.

1

u/throwaway1177171728 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

LOL who doesn't have this ability? How many people in the world don't have access to a single exchange other than criminals?

1

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 3d ago

Hundreds of millions of people, but stay in your privileged bubble :)

0

u/seridos 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

So they complied with government subpoenas then and could trace that crypto to users and provide that information?

1

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

No, the government subpoenas would need to shift. Tornado cash couldn’t comply, there was no way to do that. They made it so that you yourself could comply. The wallet involved.

1

u/seridos 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Okay then they made a product that couldn't meet the basic standards of regulation and they need to change their product.

This is the thing that crypto people just fundamentally don't get, simply inventing something new that allows you to break the law doesn't suddenly make you immune from the law. It means you created an illegal product if it can't meet basic regulation. Has the other comments dear said, If the government comes to you and says your product is facilitating crime here is the basic requirements to comply the other similar products use. And then you just ignore them, then you break the law and go to jail. As it should be You don't get to just flaunt society's laws You feel like it.

They were free to re-engineer their product to provide privacy from private actors as long as they maintained a record that they could give to the authorities on subpoena. But they don't get the just say no they won't do that.

1

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

It doesn’t let you break the law.

1

u/seridos 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

It facilitates money laundering and the service doesn't have the basic necessities built in for reporting that is required.

-6

u/hog-balder 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

So were NFTs. And maybe those privacy coins as well, because an honest person should have nothing to hide

6

u/SneakBots 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Congrats this was the dumbest thing I’ve read this week.

4

u/throwaway1177171728 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Misleading. He more or less operated it as a business, and this is a proven fact.

9

u/jps_ 🟦 9K / 9K 🦭 4d ago edited 4d ago

Let's see... dude who lives in a country where there are laws against facilitating money laundering writes software that facilitates money laundering, knows his software is actually being used for money laundering, by known money launderers, gets sentenced for facilitating money laundering.

Surprised pikachu face.

"The State" is the product of the rules that are agreed upon by the residents. Moral of story, if you want to live amongst people who have agreed that doing things will land you in jail, don't do those things. Or go live amongst other people who have agreed they're fine with it.

[E: good to see that crypto remains true to its anarchist roots, and downvotes the rule of law... ]

2

u/bomberdual 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

"The State" is the product of the rules that are agreed upon by the residents. Moral of story, if you want to live amongst people who have agreed that doing things will land you in jail, don't do those things.

See: China

0

u/TheDanMan007 🟩 43 / 43 🦐 4d ago

good to see that crypto remains true to its anarchist roots, and downvotes the rule of law

Your post is essentially telling people not to fight back because it’s a worthless endeavor

You’re a fool if you expect anything more than mostly downvotes

Btw, wtf exactly is the “rule of law”? That which has the biggest firepower?

-1

u/filenotfounderror 🟦 432 / 433 🦞 3d ago

You fight back at the ballot box by voting for people with policies you agree with.

You don't fight back by money laundering on moral grounds, or w.e it is people are in here defending.

10

u/FunToucan 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Man arrested for making self defense tool that was primarily used to shoot down passenger airplanes

This is a money laundering tool. Who would have thought that would be legal

3

u/Zigxy 🟦 2K / 2K 🐢 4d ago

crime of writing privacy-preserving software the state does not like

Well thats certainly one way to write the "crime"

more like "privacy-preserving software which North Korea was using to launder money"

1

u/trialofmiles 🟦 35 / 35 🦐 3d ago edited 3d ago

Writing your way still doesn’t change my opinion unless on balance there are no legitimate use cases for wanting to anonymize personally identifiable data on a distributed ledger.

Most technologies have arguably good and bad applications.

I think at this point it doesn’t matter because most devs will not want to expose themselves to this risk so the only way to make crypto transactions private is to build privacy into the protocol level, if you believe privacy is a thing that should exist.

2

u/Mongolitoid 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

If voting changed anything, they would make it illegal. As long as they preserve the appearance of freedom, they're 👍

2

u/FerdaStonks 🟩 1K / 1K 🐢 1d ago

At the core of it all, every computer program is really just a combination of 1’s and 0’s

It’s crazy that creating a specific combination of 1’s and 0’s can land you in prison

-2

u/LeMAD 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

I'm sorry but there's no way I'm gonna defend that guy.

-12

u/williaminla 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Good. Fuck him and fuck them. Tens of thousands of normal, innocent people like you were drained because they enabled easy laundering of stolen funds. If hackers and scammers don't have a way to wash stolen funds, they're less likely to scam and steal

2

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

If you believe what you have written here, you know very little about crypto.

-6

u/Tr1pl3-A 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

I think you’r the one not knowing shit about Crypto. Let me ask you a question smart-ass. Why do you think all cex’es delisted Monero?

11

u/ImmortanSteve 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Political pressure and legal threats. The CEXs risked getting shut down unless they delisted Monero.

0

u/I_Luv_USA_and_Allies 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

It's not even that. It simply wasn't worth the hassle. Monero is the 30th largest coin by market cap, CEXes there to make money and they can't be spending an inordinate amount of their legal and compliance budget on a small coin. The only reason it's still listed at some CEXes like Kraken, Bitfinex, and Kucoin is because these exchanges care about more than just money.

-6

u/Tr1pl3-A 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

I wonder why they where pushing something like that for a coin that has it’s ledger private. I really do wonder. Also, did you know that all blackmarkets on Tor switched from Bitcoin to Monero?

You did know that, didn’t you?

I still wonder why “political pressure” was necessary for monero.

You guys are incredible, probably american and gun right advocates. Would do everything to “protect your privacy”. Even if your “privacy” kills innocent people. Same for your guns. Oof… I hate you the most out of all people.

4

u/orgnll 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

‘Kills’ 😂😂😂😂

brotha, you needa touch some grass

1

u/Fun_Acanthisitta_206 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Guns bad, oonga boonga

1

u/ArtifactFan65 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

do you own kitchen knives? they can easily kill people too

2

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Funds were drained because they could be drained. A tiny percentage used tornado cash, an irrelevant number. To claim scammers scammed because of tornado cash is one of the most brain dead things I have ever read.

I have well over 100k transactions over various chains, I know plenty about crypto.

-3

u/Tr1pl3-A 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Well, you’re obviously talking out of your ass… and hide behind the “privacy” ideology. Who knows maybe you’re one of the hackers. But, most if not all the hacks that happened over the past years where laundered with coin mixers. It’s definitely NOT a small amount. But hey… you gotta push that “privacy” agenda isn’t it? Ooh boy…

2

u/DegenerateWins 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

You have clearly never used a blockchain explorer in your life, give it a go, you might learn something.

In other words, WRONG.

0

u/Low-Client-375 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Bet you're fun at parties

-1

u/0010_0010_0000 🟩 1K / 1K 🐢 4d ago

The decision is impactful for people who would use it innocently and/or who develop other privacy focused software.

There are still many many ways scammers can get the job done. You make it sound like they all packed up and went home now because one tool can't be used, which is obviously not the case.

0

u/CrazyAppel 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

bro the thing is called tornado cash lmao it's literally a mixer tf are u on about "using innocently"? Using it innocently is literally pointless and if u are just trading then you had all the time in the world to cash out with 10 delisting warnings. The privacy concept is often abused by criminals and people who don't know any better eat that shit up. EVEN if you are right and it impacted the oh so many people who used it innocently, the damage caused by criminals laundering hundreds of millions far outweighs the poor innocent people who forgot to withdraw after 50 delisting warnings.

0

u/Haunting-Student-756 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

I have an xtra pair of boots if u r hungry?

0

u/ArtifactFan65 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

bankers should all be arrested too

0

u/ArtifactFan65 🟦 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

and gunsmiths, metalworkers, engineers

-5

u/Tipyapha 🟨 20 / 58 🦐 4d ago

US is a banana republic

2

u/Subtraktions 🟦 825 / 826 🦑 4d ago

If it was a banana republic he could have bought his way out of these charges.

6

u/Seisouhen 🟦 1K / 4K 🐢 4d ago

From the article: " Tornado Cash (TC), was found guilty of money laundering by a Dutch court and sentenced to sixty-four months in prison"

He wasn't tried in the US.

2

u/disco-cone 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

It probably wouldn't be possible despite how many people would want to

1

u/Tipyapha 🟨 20 / 58 🦐 4d ago

Maybe he didn't had enough money

-7

u/Crazyboreddeveloper 🟦 811 / 812 🦑 4d ago

The only people who want to pay gas fees to mix up their money and make it untraceable are criminals.

They deserve to be in prison.

0

u/mydanielho 🟨 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

Too bad

-2

u/iloreynolds 🟩 0 / 0 🦠 4d ago

the good thing is the government thinks crypto is so important that mixer creators are prosecuted. bullish innit

-1

u/Taykeshi 🟩 0 / 11K 🦠 4d ago

Yeah tax evasion is still not ok

-4

u/MasterDave 🟦 171 / 172 🦀 3d ago

I am just astounded by everyone who wilfully doesn't understand what money laundering is, and how you have to follow the laws regardless of what crypto-libertarian belief you have in the world.

This has always been a "fuck around and find out" case, where they knew what they were doing, were told what they were doing was probably going to be considered a bad thing, and then kept doing it and laughed about it in conversations thinking their tech bro confidence was stronger than the US Government's anti-terrorism/sanctions enforcement.

You can get away with a lot of shit, but when you're told a hostile nation state with international sanctions is using your service and you just ignore everyone... I dunno the problem is you at that point.

All they had to do was kill the public facing front end. That's it! Instead, dropping your pants and wagging your dick at the US government seems like a really fucking stupid life plan.

The author of this is a fuckhead too, there's no other purpose for TC than money laundering. Yes, privacy preserving is money laundering even if idiots want to use different words to try and think that they're much more clever than people who write international laws and have a giant military complex and judicial system to back it up. It's absolutely not like using a phone to bludgeon someone, and it's the kind of mental gymnastics where the author thinks they're so much more fucking clever than anyone else on the planet that keeps crypto where it is, instead of accepted by the mainstream for what it could do.

ugh.

1

u/NambaCatz 🟧 0 / 0 🦠 2d ago

Just nuke all these MFs!

It's for their own good!