Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash • Hacker News Board

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#731

Post by stiltzkin » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 1:50 AM UTC

joe_the_user wrote: post #617

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?

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 Ca…

> 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.

There are legitimate using an open ledger as Ethereum, privacy is a right.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#732

Post by babypuncher » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 2:12 AM UTC

internet_user wrote: post #722

preseinger wrote: post #677

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only place on earth where gun ownership is considered a freedom rather than a threat to civil society is America.

Wrong. Czech Republic is a shall issue country in the heart of otherwise gunless Europe. 500 year long gun tradition. The only two times gun ownership/carry was suspended during those 500 years was under Nazi and Soviet occupation. Even foreigners from friendly nations can obtain a permit and carry, not even the USA doesn’t do it. Self-defence with deadly force enshrined in the constitution. Lower homicide rates than…

The Czech Republic is a welfare state with universal healthcare, free university tuition, and other incredibly strong social safety nets in place. As a result, they rank #12 on the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index. More people living happy lives without fear of economic destitution is a good way to keep crime rates low. Desperation breeds antisocial behavior.

I'll never argue that the presence of guns directly cause gun violence. There are many factors at play. Strong gun regulations are one proven means to reduce gun violence, even if they are merely treating a symptom rather than the real disease. Unfortunately, making the necessary changes to truly solve the problem is even more of an uphill battle. I could see meaningful gun legislation passing within the next 10-15 years. But it will probably be decades before we solve our problems with inequality, healthcare, and education, assuming our entire democracy does not disintegrate first.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#733

Post by paledot » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 2:13 AM UTC

stiltzkin wrote: post #731

joe_the_user wrote: post #617

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 Ca…

> 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. There are legitimate using an open ledger as Ethereum, privacy is a right.

Privacy should be a right, with limits (like all rights). I'm not sure where in the world privacy is a constitutional right beyond unreasonable-search-and-seizure.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#734

Post by internet_user » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 2:20 AM UTC

babypuncher wrote: post #732

internet_user wrote: post #722

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wrong. Czech Republic is a shall issue country in the heart of otherwise gunless Europe. 500 year long gun tradition. The only two times gun ownership/carry was suspended during those 500 years was under Nazi and Soviet occupation. Even foreigners from friendly nations can obtain a permit and carry, not even the USA doesn’t do it. Self-defence with deadly force enshrined in the constitution. Lower homicide rates than…

The Czech Republic is a welfare state with universal healthcare, free university tuition, and other incredibly strong social safety nets in place. As a result, they rank #12 on the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index. More people living happy lives without fear of economic destitution is a good way to keep crime rates low. Desperation breeds antisocial behavior. I'll never argue that the presence of guns dire…

I never seen this "inequality-adjusted Human Development Index", but I'm certain Germany ranks higher on it than CZ, it is quite bit more developed than CZ in many areas. Many

Yet, they don't have shall issue laws, no constitutional rights like in CZ and USA, and their homicides (firearms or not) are somewhat higher. They border each other and have a long shared history going back a thousand years.

Seems regulations actually matter very little, except maybe appeasing the anxious that something is being done?

Czechs do ask for medical clearance, which is probably reasonable, but I'm afraid even that could be abused by a rogue government: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_abuse_of_psychiatry

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#735

Post by internet_user » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 2:20 AM UTC

bb88 wrote: post #726

internet_user wrote: post #723

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Czech Republic has had a gun tradition for ~500 years. Homicide rates are lower than in over-regulated nearby Germany and quite a few other European countries. It’s even lower than some famously entirely gunless Asian countries. Your conclusions are not grounded in data.

Deaths before and after automobile and driving regulations can, in fact, be measured. It's just a google away to prove it.

and it has nothing to do with guns.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#736

Post by JohnHaugeland » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 2:38 AM UTC

aaaaaaaaata wrote: post #299

JohnHaugeland wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to believe that if a tool is illegal, as long as it's open source and the people making it don't have a criminal background, and as long as you call it something like "privacy software," somehow it's suddenly not illegal But this is a tool whose specific purpose it is to make it difficult to track illegal transactions. Of course this is happening. Programmers get way too wrapped up in "but I called it open s…

Same as Bitcoin is going away? Please.

I didn't say anything of the sort

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#737

Post by jschlatter » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 4:04 AM UTC

rvnx wrote: post #9

Arnt wrote: post #2

So a software developer is held responsible for the software. If the software is largely SaaS, then I can see the sense in that. A software developer of SaaS is also a service developer, arguably even a service operator although that depends on how the service is developed and operated. I'm sure the judge will be thrilled to have to listen to arguments about the with the nuances of dev, ops, devops and a distributed…

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.

> They have the technical means to control what goes on there or not.

They have less control than you may think.

Any ethereum miners (or proof-of-stake validators) who block some class of transactions immediately become vulnerable to denial of service attacks.

This came up back in 2016 with the DAO hack on ethereum[1]. Some ethereum miners considered blocking transactions that moved the stolen funds, but then realized that this was infeasible: if you block such transactions, then the DAO hacker can spam you with them. Such spam on ethereum is usually prevented by requiring the sender to spend money on each transaction (ie pay gas fees). But that fee is only charged when the transaction is included in a block -- if you refuse to include it, then the spammer pays nothing. The kicker is that, by Rice's theorem, there is no way in general to distinguish "malicious" transactions from non-malicious ones (for _any_ definition of "malicious") short of just executing them to see what they do.

So if you as an ethereum miner (or validator) try to block certain transactions, you can be forced to do unbounded amounts of work for free, ie DoS'd.

[1] https://hackingdistributed.com/2016/07/05/eth-is-more-resili...

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#738

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 4:32 AM UTC

Alupis wrote: post #721

vkou wrote: post #715

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you're in an active situation you don't have time to wait 8 months for a trial to clear things up. Rittenhouse believed he acted in self-defense... And at the time, so did Huber, and Grosskreutz.

This seems to be a complete re-writing of the facts revealed from eye witness and video accounts of the events of that evening. The jury also seems to disagree with this alternate narrative. It may be what some folks want to believe happened, but it is absolutely not the facts.

[deleted]

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#739

Post by vkou » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 4:34 AM UTC

Alupis wrote: post #721

vkou wrote: post #715

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you're in an active situation you don't have time to wait 8 months for a trial to clear things up. Rittenhouse believed he acted in self-defense... And at the time, so did Huber, and Grosskreutz.

This seems to be a complete re-writing of the facts revealed from eye witness and video accounts of the events of that evening. The jury also seems to disagree with this alternate narrative. It may be what some folks want to believe happened, but it is absolutely not the facts.

> The jury also seems to disagree with this alternate narrative.

The jury decided that Rittenhouse acted in self-defense. That finding is not inconsistent with anything I said.

The whole problem of firing off guns in a crowd is that everyone involved might be acting in self-defense, and yet still end up killing eachother.

Life isn't a video game, or an action movie. You can't always tell who the 'bad guy' is, or even if there is one.

Re: Arrest of suspected developer of Tornado Cash

#740

Post by jshen » Sat, Aug 13, 2022, 6:11 AM UTC

dcolkitt wrote: post #673

jshen wrote: post #530

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

> Then, by assuming that any cash that the surveyed consumers do not fess up to holding must be held for nefarious purposes, he concludes that 34 to 39 percent of all currency in circulation is used by criminals.[1] By contrast only 14% of Tornado Cash activity has been traced to illegal activity. https://www.independent.org/publications/tir/article.asp?id=...

You are using two very different methodologies, which is unsound.