Tornado Cash Sanctions Overturned by U.S. Appeals Court; TORN Soars Over 500%

[ABCbits]

Tornado Cash Sanctions Overturned by U.S. Appeals Court; TORN Soars Over 500%

U.S. sanctions against Tornado Cash, a service that anonymizes crypto transactions, must be abandoned, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

The decision answers a controversial privacy debate on whether the government — via a sanctions list maintained by the U.S. Treasury Department — has a right to target the technology because it's associated with criminals. The ruling reversed a district court's August ruling that had sided with the government's pursuit of what it had characterized as a "notorious" crypto-mixing service... Read more here.


It's a win for cryptocurrency user, especially those who live in US. While it seems the block will be removed, the news doesn't state whether exchange would accept ETH that comes from Tornado Cash. Your opinion is greatly appreciated.

[dkbit98]

This is unexpected outcome for me, and a big win for privacy,
Smart contracts and code is not unlawful and they should now release developers who spent all this time in prison for nothing.
I never used Tornado Cash but this is a tool that has place in ethereum space, I just hope this is also going to encourage privacy development on Bitcoin.

[ABCbits]

Smart contracts and code is not unlawful and they should now release developers who spent all this time in prison for nothing.

Good point. Although it's worth to mention Roman Semenov and Roman Storm received criminal charges in US, while Alexey Pertsev received criminal charge in Netherlands. I doubt Netherlands cares about outcome of this appeal.

[Z-tight]

I never used Tonado cash, but this is a good news for its users, it is also a good news for privacy in the crypto world. I really hope this can be a start of good things for privacy, especially in the BTC network, which is more of a concern to be personally than ETH and has been under attack from the U.S. government.

[MrSpasybo]

This is unexpected outcome for me, and a big win for privacy,
Smart contracts and code is not unlawful and they should now release developers who spent all this time in prison for nothing.
I never used Tornado Cash but this is a tool that has place in ethereum space, I just hope this is also going to encourage privacy development on Bitcoin.

I think this is not enough for Tornado Cash founders to be set free. This decision only reaffirms that code is not an asset, it does not make Tornado Cash legal in the US or help the founders escape money laundering charges.

This news only tells us that the US government is still working actively in the mixers sector. They will face many difficulties because they cannot easily implement proposals to ban mixers, especially when Mixers can be created very simply and quickly, while the inconsiderate actions of regulators can create more negative consequences than positive ones.

[dkbit98]

I think this is not enough for Tornado Cash founders to be set free. This decision only reaffirms that code is not an asset, it does not make Tornado Cash legal in the US or help the founders escape money laundering charges.

Excuse me but I think you don't know what you are talking about sir.
He didn't launder anything, he just wrote a code and for that he was put in jail for years.
Educate yourself please:
https://www.dlnews.com/articles/defi/jailed-dev-alexey-pertsev-boosted-by-tornado-cash-ruling/

[Freemind]

@MrSpasybo, the founders of Tornado Cash made a knife, but they did not commit a crime with that knife. Therefore, I believe that they are not to blame for what other people do with the product, since no one forces anyone to use it.

When a driver hits someone, who ends up in jail?. The driver or the vehicle manufacturer?. I know they are very simple examples, but I think they work perfectly to see what is happening.

[Stompix]

I think this is not enough for Tornado Cash founders to be set free. This decision only reaffirms that code is not an asset, it does not make Tornado Cash legal in the US or help the founders escape money laundering charges.

Excuse me but I think you don't know what you are talking about sir.
He didn't launder anything, he just wrote a code and for that he was put in jail for years.
Educate yourself please:
https://www.dlnews.com/articles/defi/jailed-dev-alexey-pertsev-boosted-by-tornado-cash-ruling/

You do realize that what you have now is a US Court of Justice ruling and that Alexey Pertsev was convicted of money laundering by a Dutch court, according to Dutch laws and sits in Dutch prison, right?
So how is legalizing drugs in Germany going to help a Brazilian person thrown in jail in Singapore?

[TomPluz]

Indeed, this is a big win for the whole cryptocurrency industry. While I don't condone criminals like scammers, hackers, illegal traffickers, drug dealers and others of the same nature, we could not criminalize something just because there are some criminals using it. Will anyone say that the fiat money used by common criminals will also be illegal? There must be a fine line that the government and law enforcement has to define well...and this reversal for Tornado Cash in its long and arduous fight should be considered as a classic example why the industry should really fight back the government if there is a need to do so. And this comes at the time when we are about to enter the Trump era. Good news and congratulations to Tornado Cash and TORN holders.

[yhiaali3]

Yes, it’s a big win for cryptocurrencies

From what I understand from the news, the court based its ruling on the fact that the US Treasury exceeded its legal authority by imposing sanctions on the open source software itself, rather than targeting specific individuals or entities.

For his part, Circuit Judge Don Willett noted that concerns about money laundering using the protocol are legitimate, but he explained that federal law does not give the Treasury the authority to impose sanctions on immutable smart contracts as property.

That’s pretty simple. Criminals using a smart contract does not mean the creator of the smart contract has become a criminal, so I don’t know on what legal basis the founder of Tornado Cash was charged with money laundering and sentenced to prison.?

[Stompix]

Criminals using a smart contract does not mean the creator of the smart contract has become a criminal, so I don’t know on what legal basis the founder of Tornado Cash was charged with money laundering and sentenced to prison.?

Three important things
- the founder was found guilty in the Netherlands, this decision is from a US court
- the ruling doesn't matter in a conviction if the laws change after you have been convicted and after your trial doesn't matter you're still trialed on old decisions

But most important, a lot of people have blown this out of context, the ruling says that the US treasury can't sanction unknown transactions just because they originated from tornado cash,  again this is not about the developer, any court can still find him guilty of developing a tool that is designed with the purpose of money laundering, the decision of today doesn't invalidate this accusation.