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Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

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Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#611

Post by JeremyNT »

carlosdp wrote: post #264
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Am i alone in thinking this is not going to fly if all he did was write some software that helps with your financial anonymity? Probably. That said, he is arrested under Dutch law. We have no evidence this is tied to U.S. sanctions. As others mention, Dutch law restricts cash transactions in ways U.S. law does not. Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being…

> Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being used to launder money. If the developer kept working on it, they knew what they were doing. People keep saying this in this thread. Is everyone at WhatsApp also guilty of a crime for continuing to work on WhatsApp even though they know the Taliban uses it for communication?

Cryptocurrency mixers exist solely to launder money. This is literally all they are useful for.

WhatsApp has legitimate, non-criminal use cases.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#612

Post by caeril »

mrkramer wrote: post #574
ROTMetro wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most crimes have what's called a 'Mens Rea' element, which means you had to have criminal intent. So before they knew the Taliban uses it, not a crime. Now that they know? Well, kind of a grey area. I bet you could construct an argument that they commited a crime if any NEW feature/code commit somehow benefits the Taliban after they knew the Taliban uses it. It's legal for me to sell someone a car. It's no longer leg…

>Most crimes have what's called a 'Mens Rea' element, which means you had to have criminal intent. That's what Ross Ulbricht was arguing; the creator and the operator of the biggest Dark Web drug marketplace called Silk Road but it didn't work out for him. Because you as an operator of a platform have liability of what your users do or in another words you need to take action in order to prevent illicit activities. R…

And just like Ulbricht set a great example for future darknet market operators to take OPSEC far, far more seriously, so too will this overreach of authorities drive authors and operators of tumbler/mixer software/services to do the same.

The authorities are stepping on their own dicks, here, in a manner of speaking. Most of the biggest darknet markets operate far better, and far more clandestinely, precisely because Judge Forrest threw the book at Ross.

And they're doing the same thing here. This really sucks for Pertsev, but going hard on him like this will set the standard for a brighter future in the fight against State-enforced financial tyranny.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#613

Post by TechBro8615 »

colechristensen wrote: post #475
dcolkitt wrote: post #260

A lot of the apologists for this are making arguments along the lines of "being decentralized doesn't make you exempt from the rules" or "imagine if a bank laundered this much money". The problem is it doesn't make sense to treat protocols like companies. And it definitely doesn't make sense to treat protocol devs as if they were the executives of those companies. The CEO of a bank and the lead dev of a protocol have…

Starting a money laundrymat and expecting not to get charged with a crime is a bit absurd. Pretending that it's totally fine because it's "privacy" not money laundering because crypto is special... is likewise absurd.

It’s more like you gave away a DIY laundromat kit for free, which some people used to make laundromats, and other people used to launder money.

Example of a “legitimate” use case for tumbling: your employer pays you in Bitcoin and you don’t want them to know where you spend the money they give you.

A public ledger means anyone can read it, not just the government. And so anonymizing your transactions means hiding them from everyone, not just the government.

It’s fine if you believe the government and your bank should be able to read your transactions. But what about your crazy ex girlfriend or the guy you fired last week?

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#614

Post by nostrademons »

111111101101 wrote: post #135
sph wrote: 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.

> The only explanation is that he is dead. He might be dead but someone has control of his keys & logins as they used his accounts to defend Dorian Nakamoto. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2014/03/06/bitcoin-...

That message was sent about 6 months before Hal Finney died. (Who, incidentally, lived a couple blocks away from Dorian Nakamoto.) Personally my money is that Satoshi Nakamoto = Hal Finney, and he's cryopreserved and likely to come back in a couple centuries to sit on top of a few quadrillion-dollar Bitcoin hoard.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#615

Post by MrPatan »

jshen wrote: post #530
MrPatan wrote: post #521

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear criminals keep using cash to launder money, but the central banks keep printing cash! Outrageous! Unbelievable behaviour! To jail with the lot, straight away!

The vast majority of cash is used for legitimate purposes, the same is not true of tornado cash. They are not remotely in the same ball park.

Most cash transactions are legitimate, but are you 100% confident that most cash volume is legitimate?

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#616

Post by cortesoft »

dannyw wrote: post #155

For those who think this is good: Private keys can be represented in text. Like this: KwTHJw865SLeTAjK7otYb5bL5mwutBb2vDxxF7kGf5XvY7QttnvM Encrypted messaging apps like Matrix or Signal, can be used to send strings with private keys, anonymously. It's very difficult to hold a position that financial privacy tools are bad, but encrypted messaging apps are good; because they are really not that different.

You are thinking like a computer programmer and not a lawyer. There is a classic article that demonstrates the difference called “What colour are your bits?” https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23

The law isn’t actually talking about math or numbers or encryption, even though it seems like it is to computer programmers. The math doesn’t matter to the law, what you use it for does.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#617

Post by joe_the_user »

carlosdp wrote: post #264
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Am i alone in thinking this is not going to fly if all he did was write some software that helps with your financial anonymity? Probably. That said, he is arrested under Dutch law. We have no evidence this is tied to U.S. sanctions. As others mention, Dutch law restricts cash transactions in ways U.S. law does not. Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being…

> Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being used to launder money. If the developer kept working on it, they knew what they were doing. People keep saying this in this thread. Is everyone at WhatsApp also guilty of a crime for continuing to work on WhatsApp even though they know the Taliban uses it for communication?

I think this sort of question is being argued with youtube-dl and we can see where it goes. The entertainment industry argues the purpose of youtube-dl is to pirate content. Youtube-dl argues that there are in fact many legitimate uses for it and this argument has so far prevailed.

In the case of WhatsApp, the app has many legitimate uses, notably speech, which is often protected as a right. In the case of Tornado Cash, the app's only use is concealing the origin of financial transactions, which some could argue is never a legitimate use (and which others would argue is a legitimate use). Maybe the final arguments will come down to this legitimacy.

ianal etc.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#618

Post by mcast »

Scoundreller wrote: post #544
joelthelion wrote: post #514

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not. Trying to sell it would crash the market. Still worth a lot, obviously.

Can he just pay off some kind of smart contract with it that ignores the provenance of the Bitcoin? Like, get a loan for $20b in a stablecoin with the payback being $21b in btc in a year?

If any of the BTC founder's blocks suddenly became active it would crash the price because most people would suspect someone found an exploit in the contract/hash or the keys were stolen.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#619

Post by unboxingelf »

JeremyNT wrote: post #611
carlosdp wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being used to launder money. If the developer kept working on it, they knew what they were doing. People keep saying this in this thread. Is everyone at WhatsApp also guilty of a crime for continuing to work on WhatsApp even though they know the Taliban uses it for communication?

Cryptocurrency mixers exist solely to launder money. This is literally all they are useful for. WhatsApp has legitimate, non-criminal use cases.

False. Here is the definition of money laundering:

  1. The act of engaging in transactions designed to obscure the origin of money that has been obtained illegally.
  2. concealing the source of illegally gotten money
Anyone can use a cryptocurrency mixer with legally obtained cryptocurrency.

Tornado Cash has legitimate, non-criminal use cases.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#620

Post by iszomer »

JeremyNT wrote: post #611
carlosdp wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also, in June—when the link says they began the investigation—it was publicly known Tornado was being used to launder money. If the developer kept working on it, they knew what they were doing. People keep saying this in this thread. Is everyone at WhatsApp also guilty of a crime for continuing to work on WhatsApp even though they know the Taliban uses it for communication?

Cryptocurrency mixers exist solely to launder money. This is literally all they are useful for. WhatsApp has legitimate, non-criminal use cases.

I wonder how contrarians would argue against this..

"Oh, because this blockchain isn't anonymous enough I must use a mixer!"

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