{"id":56943,"date":"2023-08-18T01:49:38","date_gmt":"2023-08-18T05:49:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/?p=56943"},"modified":"2023-08-18T01:49:41","modified_gmt":"2023-08-18T05:49:41","slug":"crypto-mixer-tornado-cash-loses-lawsuit-over-us-sanctions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/crypto-mixer-tornado-cash-loses-lawsuit-over-us-sanctions\/","title":{"rendered":"Crypto Mixer Tornado Cash Loses Lawsuit Over US Sanctions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Judge denied the removal of <a href=\"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/as-a-result-of-us-sanctions-the-nft-marketplace-opensea-removed-users.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">US sanctions <\/a>against Tornado Cash by comparing its smart contracts to vending machines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-1024x683.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-56946\" srcset=\"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-1024x683.webp 1024w, https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-300x200.webp 300w, https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-768x512.webp 768w, https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-750x500.webp 750w, https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1-1140x760.webp 1140w, https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1.webp 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Crypto Mixer Tornado Cash Loses Lawsuit Over US Sanctions<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>On Thursday, August 17, a federal magistrate denied a motion from crypto participants and giants such as Coinbase, who argued that the U.S. Treasury's sanctions against the crypto mixing service provider Tornado Cash were excessive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Six individuals, including two Coinbase employees, were denied summary judgment by Judge Robert Pitman of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas on the grounds that the Treasury exceeded its authority in attempting to prevent financial transactions that benefit foreign terrorists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, who were backed by Coinbase, alleged that the department's actions affected blameless Americans who used the private service for legal purposes. However, the judge chose to concur with the decisions of the <a href=\"https:\/\/home.treasury.gov\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">U.S. Treasury.<span class=\"wpil-link-icon\" title=\"Link goes to external site.\" style=\"margin: 0 0 0 5px;\"><svg width=\"24\" height=\"24\" style=\"height:16px; width:16px; fill:#000000; stroke:#000000; display:inline-block;\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.1\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" xmlns:svg=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><g id=\"wpil-svg-outbound-7-icon-path\" fill=\"none\" clip-path=\"url(#clip0_31_188)\">\r\n                            <path d=\"M9.16724 14.8891L20.1672 3.88908\" stroke-linecap=\"round\"\/>\r\n                            <path d=\"M13.4497 3.53554L20.5208 3.53554L20.5208 10.6066\" stroke-linecap=\"round\" stroke-linejoin=\"round\"\/>\r\n                            <path d=\"M17.5 13.5L17.5 16.26C17.5 17.4179 17.5 17.9968 17.2675 18.4359C17.0799 18.7902 16.7902 19.0799 16.4359 19.2675C15.9968 19.5 15.4179 19.5 14.26 19.5L7.74 19.5C6.58213 19.5 6.0032 19.5 5.56414 19.2675C5.20983 19.0799 4.92007 18.7902 4.73247 18.4359C4.5 17.9968 4.5 17.4179 4.5 16.26L4.5 9.74C4.5 8.58213 4.5 8.0032 4.73247 7.56414C4.92007 7.20983 5.20982 6.92007 5.56414 6.73247C6.0032 6.5 6.58213 6.5 7.74 6.5L11 6.5\" stroke-linecap=\"round\"\/>\r\n                        <\/g>\r\n                        <defs>\r\n                            <clipPath id=\"clip0_31_188\">\r\n                                <rect fill=\"white\" height=\"24\" width=\"24\"\/>\r\n                            <\/clipPath>\r\n                        <\/defs><\/svg><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-cash-tornado-versus-u-s-treasury\">Cash Tornado Versus U.S. Treasury<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>A year ago, the <a href=\"https:\/\/ofac.treasury.gov\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) <span class=\"wpil-link-icon\" title=\"Link goes to external site.\" style=\"margin: 0 0 0 5px;\"><svg width=\"24\" height=\"24\" style=\"height:16px; width:16px; fill:#000000; stroke:#000000; display:inline-block;\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.1\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" xmlns:svg=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\"><use href=\"#wpil-svg-outbound-7-icon-path\"><\/use><\/svg><\/span><\/a>of the U.S. Treasury accused Tornado Cash of laundering over\u00a0<strong>$7 billion<\/strong>\u00a0worth of cryptocurrencies since its founding in 2019. As a result, the agency imposed sanctions on cryptocurrency wallets associated with Tornado Cash and intelligent contract-related protocols.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The digital asset research firm Chainalysis reported 2023 that it had linked nearly $2 billion worth of cryptocurrency misappropriated in 2022 to North Korean hacking groups. Moreover, according to Chainalysis, these organizations relied significantly on Tornado Cash to launder their stolen funds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The judge compared smart contracts to vending machines in a recent ruling. Judge wrote: \u201cThis reinforces the Court\u2019s point. Vending machines are examples of unilateral contracts. And like vending machines, a smart contract is a tool that carries out a particular, predetermined task. The fact that smart contracts do so without additional human intervention, like a vending machine, or that they are immutable, does not affect its status as type of contract and, thus, a type of property within the meaning of the regulation.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Judge denied the removal of US sanctions against Tornado Cash by comparing its smart contracts to vending machines. On Thursday, August 17, a federal magistrate denied a motion from crypto participants and giants such as Coinbase, who argued that the U.S. Treasury&#8217;s sanctions against the crypto mixing service provider Tornado Cash were excessive. Six [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":53,"featured_media":56946,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,32],"tags":[5501,5609,15872],"class_list":["post-56943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-crypto-exchange-news","tag-coinbase-2","tag-tornado-cash","tag-us-sanctions-2"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/barca-1.webp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/53"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56943\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/coinscreed.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}