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Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

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Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are we not targeting the hackers instead of privacy advocates? Should we arrest the Tor developers because North Koreans use Tor?

Quite hard to target hackers inside a hostile country like NK.

Hard to pursue the perpetrator does not justify pursuing someone else.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not familiar with the money laundering laws. But do they state that you can’t buy something anonymously and without an audit trail? Because spending legally obtained cash seems anonymous to me. Is anonymizing your digital spend with legally obtained capital that different?

I can't speak for the US, but in Germany, transactions between countries over 10k€ must be reported to the Bundesbank. There are similar limits for inner-country transactions with businesses, especially financial ones. I assume the USA has similar rules. So small cash transaction are fine, but as soon as larger sums are involved it's going to be very problematic. Since crypto currencies, nearly by definition, don't c…

> It's even worse if they frame the mixer as financial institution

Where do they?

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#313
post #228

If someone built something that said "Launder your money here" and it took in a bunch of money, and then disbursed it sans fees to hide where it came from... they'd say it was money laundering and arrest the person. Can anyone explain the difference here? Or why anyone is "shocked" that this is happening cause it's crypto? Just seems kinda childish to think crypto's somehow special and not just a tool for moving mone…

A private key is a 256 bit integer.

> If someone built something that said "Launder your [256 bit integers] here" and it took in a bunch of [256 bit integers], and then [encrypted] it sans fees to hide where it came from... they'd say it was [256 bit integer] laundering and arrest the person.

When you compare this to encrypting 256 bit integers, text, or E2EE chat protocols, the shock is easier to understand. People should not be treated as a criminal for building Matrix E2EE protocol that enables privacy, they should not be treated as criminal for building Tornado Cash protocol that enables privacy.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN in its current avatar would probably cheer on if the Patriot Act was enacted today. Been on this site for a decade. Never seen it this filled with Big Gov and Big Tech apologists.

Yeah when I first discovered this site in like 2017, it seemed to be a place of tech-literate counter-culture folks. Now the counter-culture seems to be non-existent, and actually looked down on. At this point, the majority of the comments I read sound like a CNN anchor script. Ha, maybe it's their web developers.

The greater the threat which a community represents to the vested control hierarchy, the more intensely it becomes infiltrated and coopted. This is an Iron Law.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#315
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Satoshi has demonstrated inhuman levels of restraint. The only explanation is that he is dead. The others are that he is not human, or that it's a committee defying Hanlon's razor: i.e. not governed by stupidity like most human affairs, but malice. Both are equally improbable.

Some people have alleged that Paul Leroux, who is sitting in prison right now, is Satoshi. That would explain why Satoshi hasn't moved any coins or sought fame.

That would be highly interesting. Not like you can get easy access to the internet inside a prison so he would have to either convince a guard to bring him a phone to access it or possible use his lawyer. Anyone who visits they would likely record his conversation with the exception of his lawyer. But what good will the money do him, he isn't set to be out until he is like 72 years old and looking at him he is not in prime shape and may not even last that long. Maybe he could wait until enough is at stake like other countries adopting bitcoin as a currency and when the time is right find a way to put all his coins on the table causing a crash in price. I can't imagine what end game he would choose if he truly is the creator and how he has had so much will power he has had up until now to not move any of his coins. One thing is for sure I really do hope I come to HN one day and see the top story with 2000 plus points saying Satoshi's coins have just been moved.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#316
post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could be the first of many. Up until yesterday we lived in a world (by which I mean the Western World) where no one had ever been arrested just for writing open source code. It appears that this is no longer the case. This is how the Overton window gets moved, one step at a time, not in huge leaps. And clearly there are powerful forces interested in moving it in a direction that would likely be detrimental to many…

How do you know that this guy was arrested "just for writing open source code?" The whole point of my comment was that he was probably arrested for more than that... Or at least, we should wait to see what the evidence against the guy is. If you go around saying "the sky is falling! they're coming for the developers!" then it turns out the guy was actually doing bad stuff to help launder money, you're going to make i…

> How do you know that this guy was arrested "just for writing open source code?"

I don't know that, but that currently appears to be the case and I have yet to see any evidence to the contrary.

EDIT: The title of the page is "Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash". So they are certainly making it appear that they consider having developed Tornado Cash to itself be worthy of arrest.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#317
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The big difference: Airbus and Boeing do everything to prevent attacks and hijacking and it is against their fundamental interest and the interest of their customers. Whereas, for a crypto network, the more funds flows in, the better for the operators and eventually for the developers (who gets paid by node operators via increased coin value or donations). The less compliance or questions asked, or the more anonymity…

> Airbus and Boeing does everything to prevent attacks and hijacking and it is against their fundamental interest and the interest of their customers. They do today. Back in 2001, flying was a lot different. For starters, there was no such thing as an armoured door between the flight deck and the passenger compartment, mostly because such a door is heavy and costs extra fuel.

...and when experience showed that the existing system was not adequate they beefed it by adding those doors.

That's one big difference between those whose products can be used for both good and bad who do not get in legal trouble over the bad use and those that do. There's some threshold for a given type of produce of tolerable bad use. When they product is approaching or exceeding that they make changes to lower it, or if it can't be fixed abandon the product.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#318
post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.coe.int/en/web/impact-convention-human-rights/ri...

There is zero law suggesting financial transactions are subject to Article 8 protection.

What about right to own property alone as well as in association with others.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#319
post #252
post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One fact is that it’s Dutch law enforcement, not international law enforcement. A second fact is that Dutch law enforcement have stated “multiple arrests are not ruled out,” so we’re not talking about “just one guy” anymore. Finally, I’m not optimizing for credibility when stating my opinion, nor am I defending a single person. I do not think arresting developers is an effective solution for preventing money launderi…

Sorry, but this is nonsense. This was strictly done because of US pressure and sanction. Netherlands would have done nothing and likely the US did the logging and tracing of this individual.

We'll see if he gets extradited to the US.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#320

Ah yes, arrest developers of open source privacy code and blame them for North Korea money laundering rather than going after the people actually committing crimes. Sounds about right. Privacy is not a crime, it’s a human right! Sorry that it makes the polices job harder, but our rights are more important. And didn’t we go through all this already in the 90s? Are we now gonna start arresting all cryptographers? This…

The right to privacy ends at the moment that it is used as an excuse to evade the law. Every country recognizes warrants for this reason.

Fuck the law when civil asset forfeiture and qualified immunity exist.
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