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Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

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Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#361

Post by lalaland1125 »

dcolkitt wrote: post #323
clucas wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the international law enforcement community is really trying to go after "all cryptographers" why do you think we haven't seen more arrests? Why do you think they only arrested this guy? I get that you really want to defend crypto, but I think a simpler explanation is that they have good reasons to believe that this guy was doing more than just the stuff you're trying to defend (making privacy code). It would be l…

> If the international law enforcement community is really trying to go after "all cryptographers" why do you think we haven't seen more arrests? Why do you think they only arrested this guy? Because the standard playbook for "cracking down" is to first win cases against the least sympathetic, most prosecutable targets. Once that's under your belt, you gradually expand outwards to increasingly ordinary people. It's w…

> As abortion laws restart, states won't begin by arresting anyone who's ever donated to Planned Parenthood. But if left unchecked, some will eventually get there.

First thing, you can't arrest people for prior donations as postfacto laws are unconstitutional.

Second, if abortion is considered murder, why should it be legal to fund illegal abortions? We generally don't allow people to fund criminal activity for good reasons.

Do you think it should be legal to donate to criminal organizations?

What are your thoughts on donations to Al-Qaeda?

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#362

Post by naet »

clippablematt wrote: post #60

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…

I'm in favor of privacy, but if you're profiting off designing and operating a system that you know is being used to facilitate large amounts of criminal money laundering (some going to known foreign government agents), you're more or less asking to be arrested.

You can pose an argument that your service has some positive impact in certain cases, but you can't flat deny any negative impact or responsibility for consequences of your service. This is true of any and all services, whether they relate to privacy or not.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#363

Post by dcolkitt »

kube-system wrote: post #326
dcolkitt wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You've obviously never heard of the Fifth Amendment. It's actually quite the opposite, the Constitution enhances your right to privacy (by refusing to talk about something) when doing so could be used to prosecute you for a crime.

The 5th doesn't give you privacy to anything outside of your thoughts inside your head, which isn't related to anything being discussed here. Everything else in the US is covered by the 4th.

Wrong. For example courts have consistently ruled that you can’t be compelled to unlock your phone or decrypt your hard disk if you’re invoking the 5th

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#364

Post by akimball »

darkcha0s wrote: post #199
rvnx wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems reasonable to expect that Ethereum operators share responsibility in case of usage of their network for malicious or criminal activity. They have the technical means to control what goes on there or not. Otherwise it's like if you run P2P nodes and claim pedo pictures aren't your problem.

I know I will get a hail of downvotes for this, but again you're comparing apples and oranges. The operators are using crypto for a wide range of applications. Using a mixer has probably 99.9% illegal reasons and 0.1% legitimate uses. Making money laundering harder is a good thing, no matter how many people here will try to convince you it isn't.

Only if you presume that private deeds are illegitimate. That appears to reverse the presumption of innocence, without which the law becomes nothing more than a tool to destroy the enemies of the prosecutors.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#365

Post by notch656a »

lalaland1125 wrote: post #357
chitowneats wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Some will ... arrest anyone who's ever donated to Planned Parenthood" This is a hysterical prediction.

Yeah, you can't make postfacto laws. Sure, the government might make it illegal to donate to Planned Parenthood in the future but per the constitution they can't make prior donations illegal.

Unless you find that abortion was never legal because the state statute on "murder" is vague. For instance, if the court re-interprets a murder statute then I believe that would apply to prior cases and then prior donations to any establishment assisting in abortion could be pursued as conspiracy.

There's a lot of room to re-interpret laws that were already on the books in ways that make prior "crimes" illegal today when they wouldn't have been interpreted that way when they happened.

There's other things that can be done as well, like searching their residence for every single code violation possible, daily police visits, civil asset forfeiture, fine-comb tax auditing, etc. It's a pretty well oiled machine for finding ways to convict people or make their life hell through the legal system if that's the goal.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#366

Post by f38zf5vdt »

chitowneats wrote: post #344
f38zf5vdt wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Various states already prohibit using public money to fund abortions, a prohibition on private funds for an act they consider extremely illegal and equivalent to murder is not a stretch. "12 states prohibit state family planning funds from going to any entity that provides abortions." https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/state-family...

And you believe it will be legal for them to arrest you for donations you made before those laws were in place? That's assuming you're correct they would try to ban private funds. A big assumption.

IANAL.

No, ex post facto laws aren't legal.

If the state law says so, yes, you could get an out-of-state charge for providing financial aid to an abortion operation after contributing to an organization that funds them. With Roe v Wade gone, I am not sure there is a federal precedent for how to handle crimes relating to committing a murder in one state that is not considered a murder in another state.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#367

Post by spaceman_2020 »

LightG wrote: post #250
spaceman_2020 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude created a company that built a reusable rocket and you accuse him of selling vaporware.

Your comment doesn't negate the vaporware comment.

How? I’m no fanboy but delivering working products pretty much negates all accusations of peddling vaporware.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#368

Post by altairprime »

dcolkitt wrote: post #323
clucas wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the international law enforcement community is really trying to go after "all cryptographers" why do you think we haven't seen more arrests? Why do you think they only arrested this guy? I get that you really want to defend crypto, but I think a simpler explanation is that they have good reasons to believe that this guy was doing more than just the stuff you're trying to defend (making privacy code). It would be l…

> If the international law enforcement community is really trying to go after "all cryptographers" why do you think we haven't seen more arrests? Why do you think they only arrested this guy? Because the standard playbook for "cracking down" is to first win cases against the least sympathetic, most prosecutable targets. Once that's under your belt, you gradually expand outwards to increasingly ordinary people. It's w…

The standard playbook for arresting specific criminals overlaps with the more extreme playbook you described.

Whether it’s the former or the latter cannot be determined from this arrest alone.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#369

Post by RansomStark »

threeseed wrote: post #76
clippablematt wrote: post #60

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…

> rather than going after the people actually committing crimes Actually they go after the people committing the crime AND those facilitating it. > Privacy is not a crime, it’s a human right (a) Not a human right, (b) not enshrined in any country's law, (c) does not absolve illegal behaviour.

> Not a human right

The UN disagrees. Article 12 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: "No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks". [0]

You can argue what the right to privacy means and the limitations of that freedom in respect of non-arbitrary interference are acceptable, but to claim privacy is not a human right is simply incorrect.

[0] https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-huma...

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#370

Post by lalaland1125 »

notch656a wrote: post #365
lalaland1125 wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, you can't make postfacto laws. Sure, the government might make it illegal to donate to Planned Parenthood in the future but per the constitution they can't make prior donations illegal.

Unless you find that abortion was never legal because the state statute on "murder" is vague. For instance, if the court re-interprets a murder statute then I believe that would apply to prior cases and then prior donations to any establishment assisting in abortion could be pursued as conspiracy. There's a lot of room to re-interpret laws that were already on the books in ways that make prior "crimes" illegal today…

That's not how our constitution works. Roe v Wade is binding for any actions a person carries out before it got overturned in Dobbs.

Even if a court ruling or legal interpretation gets overturned later, that doesn't allow you to prosecute people who were relying on that legal interpretation.

Judges aren't mindless machines and they realize the importance of avoiding postfacto prosecutions.

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