Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

patrick-breyer.de

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 41 posts

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#11

Post by tedajax »

rendaw wrote: post #7
tedajax wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to imagine because when the government tells Spotify that people are laundering money through their platform they kill the account and hand over data to investigators? They don't deliberately run a service explicitly built to enable money laundering. Basic things you can think about if you try really.

There was nothing explicit in the linked court document AFAICT, and I sincerely hope the judge isn't making decisions based on gut feeling and "common sense".

I don't think you understand how courts work

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#12

Post by zomglings »

tedajax wrote: post #5
zomglings wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was he, specifically, laundering money? People launder money through Spotify, why aren't the creators of Spotify being raked across the coals like this?

I'm going to imagine because when the government tells Spotify that people are laundering money through their platform they kill the account and hand over data to investigators? They don't deliberately run a service explicitly built to enable money laundering. Basic things you can think about if you try really.

Tornado Cash is permissionless. Any data the creator of Tornado Cash could hand over, the government would already have because Ethereum and EVM-based blockchains are public by default.

The only service being run is a web client and relayers to permissionless smart contracts. I believe these are/were being run by a foundation.

Also some things you can discover if you try, really.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#13

Post by jncfhnb »

zomglings wrote: post #3
tedajax wrote: post #2

No, privacy is not a crime... But money laundering is.

Was he, specifically, laundering money? People launder money through Spotify, why aren't the creators of Spotify being raked across the coals like this?

I’m guessing the payment processors of Spotify are at least routing through KYC and basic control.

Tornado is flagrantly mixing with known offenders, and even indicated them as such in the UI.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#14

Post by jsnell »

zomglings wrote: post #12
tedajax wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to imagine because when the government tells Spotify that people are laundering money through their platform they kill the account and hand over data to investigators? They don't deliberately run a service explicitly built to enable money laundering. Basic things you can think about if you try really.

Tornado Cash is permissionless. Any data the creator of Tornado Cash could hand over, the government would already have because Ethereum and EVM-based blockchains are public by default. The only service being run is a web client and relayers to permissionless smart contracts. I believe these are/were being run by a foundation. Also some things you can discover if you try, really.

If you make a system that by design can't meet the legal requirements for preventing money laundering, that's not actually a good defense. It's the opposite.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#15

Post by kbolino »

beaeglebeachedd wrote: post #10
rendaw wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Signal? Protonmail? Personal safes? Https? Car window tinting/privacy films? Government mints? What reason is there to use cash today except to engage in crime?

If cash, tobacco, or motorcycles were in invented this century they'd have been outlawed. Digital encryption barely squeeked through due to popping up before 9/11.

Digital encryption was heavily restricted (at least in the US) until the 1990s. Its genesis during the Cold War likely played a part in that, which may be to your point.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#16

Post by zomglings »

jncfhnb wrote: post #13
zomglings wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Was he, specifically, laundering money? People launder money through Spotify, why aren't the creators of Spotify being raked across the coals like this?

I’m guessing the payment processors of Spotify are at least routing through KYC and basic control. Tornado is flagrantly mixing with known offenders, and even indicated them as such in the UI.

Tornado Cash doesn't maintain accounts for those users. They are using Ethereum accounts created completely independently of Tornado Cash.

The contracts are permissionless. Any Ethereum account can call the "deposit" function. That same account can generate a zk-proof of the deposit. Any Ethereum account can withdraw, provided they have a proof of deposit.

The proof of deposit could be communicated in any number of ways that have nothing to do with Tornado Cash - mail, email, Signal, whatever.

If the account into which you are receiving a withdrawal doesn't have money to pay for the transaction, you can send your proof to a relayer who submits the transaction for a portion of the withdrawal amount. Because it's a zero-knowledge proof, the relayer does not know which account made the initial deposit.

The whole system is private and permissionless. I don't know what Tornado Cash could do other than simply indicating that a known bad actor made a deposit.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#17

Post by tedajax »

zomglings wrote: post #12
tedajax wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to imagine because when the government tells Spotify that people are laundering money through their platform they kill the account and hand over data to investigators? They don't deliberately run a service explicitly built to enable money laundering. Basic things you can think about if you try really.

Tornado Cash is permissionless. Any data the creator of Tornado Cash could hand over, the government would already have because Ethereum and EVM-based blockchains are public by default. The only service being run is a web client and relayers to permissionless smart contracts. I believe these are/were being run by a foundation. Also some things you can discover if you try, really.

> The only service being run is a web client and relayers to permissionless smart contracts. I believe these are/were being run by a foundation.

They didn't build a service because it's "just" a web client and relayers is an interesting take but sadly, very stupid.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#18

Post by illusive4080 »

meowster wrote: post #6

Should have used Monero.

How long until Monero is given the same untouchable status as Tornado Cash?

I can’t fathom what’s wrong with Tornado Cash when I can have the same privacy with real cash. Just because my transaction is on the internet, I shouldn’t be forced to de-anonymize

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#19

Post by jsnell »

lesuorac wrote: post #8
tedajax wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to imagine because when the government tells Spotify that people are laundering money through their platform they kill the account and hand over data to investigators? They don't deliberately run a service explicitly built to enable money laundering. Basic things you can think about if you try really.

You do notice in your example Spotify doesn't shut down? Afaik, nobody is allegeding that Tornado Cash maintained user accounts for money launderers. It'd be more akin to if you had say McDonalds and people used your parking lot for Craigslist transactions (some of which were fradualent). Should you be required to close that McDonalds?

Spotify doesn't shut down because they're primarily providing a legitimate service to legitimate people. The money laundering traffic there has to be absolutely miniscule compared to the legitimate traffic. It makes basically no sense as a money laundering avenue, and the only source for this (that I could find with quick Googling) is an "anonymous police officer" who just clainms that it's happening, but can't even put a number on the magnitude.

But if it really were happening at any kind of volume, it's obvious that Spotify would be quite willing to make their KYC requirements for artists stricter. Any payments they'd made would obviously be made through the banking system, and the law enforcement would be able to trace them to the next hop, which again would have done their KYC due diligence.

The crypto mixer, on the other hand, has no real use case except money laundering. They are also obviously unwilling to do any KYC, and unable to manage their system in a way that would prevent it from being used for money laundering. And it wasn't by accident. It was fully intentional and by design.

Re: Conviction of Tornado Cash programmer: Privacy is not a crime

#20

Post by zomglings »

jsnell wrote: post #14
zomglings wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tornado Cash is permissionless. Any data the creator of Tornado Cash could hand over, the government would already have because Ethereum and EVM-based blockchains are public by default. The only service being run is a web client and relayers to permissionless smart contracts. I believe these are/were being run by a foundation. Also some things you can discover if you try, really.

If you make a system that by design can't meet the legal requirements for preventing money laundering, that's not actually a good defense. It's the opposite.

How can conceiving of such a system and building it be a crime? It's like labelling thought a crime.

I would accept that operating such a system is indefensible.

But it's not as if the creator of Tornado Cash was solely maintaining servers that made this possible. Everyone running an Ethereum node (even if they aren't mining) is running the infrastructure that Tornado Cash runs on.

So why is the guy who quite brilliantly conceived and executed this idea being punished like this?

Post reply on HN