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At this point there is a real risk he will become a target of made-up charges, and that the US gov will attempt to have him extradited and jailed just to send a
by lizardactivist 4y ago
At this point there is a real risk he will become a target of made-up charges, and that the US gov will attempt to have him extradited and jailed just to send a message.
He is writing fin-tech FOSS, but because that software and the space it targets is not fully under US gov control, his well-being and entire future is now at risk.
This is not the freedom the US keeps talking about. It is tyranny.
- WheatM 4y ago
- viro 4y agowhat use outside of money laundering did this tool have?
- luxuryballs 4y agomaybe some government could use it for doing secret spy stuff
- ragona 4y agoThere are entities other than the government that you might want to hide money from.
- jedimind 4y agoFor privacy. It's like asking what SSL is good for other than criminal activity. Vitalik himself used tornado cash for private transactions. Do you think that Vitalik openly launders money?
- bb88 4y ago> Do you think that Vitalik openly launders money? Who can tell? Isn't that the point of Tornado Cash?
- jedimind 4y agoAgain, no. It's like asking "Isn't the point of SSL or End2End encryption for chats committing illegal activities?" Authoritarian governments should really start hanging around on HN, they would love the sentiment here...
- bb88 4y agoYou asked a rhetorical question. I gave you a rhetorical answer -- in the form of a question. The point is that you can't know. That's the purpose of a money laundering operation. I think maybe a better analogy would have been to use VPN rather than SSL. Because SSL doesn't obscure the source and destination, just the contents of the message.
- jedimind 4y ago>The point is that you can't know. That's the purpose of a money laundering operation. Wrong. You can in fact know, because it has auditing tools which allow one to disclose transactions exactly for AML reasons. At least put in some research before you engage in a discussion where it becomes apparent that you clearly lack the knowledge to participate in a fruitful discussion. Making factually incorrect statements like yours as if they were facts is misleading a lot of people.
- bb88 4y ago
- dylkil 4y agowhat use outside of hiding something illegal does privacy have
- JonChesterfield 4y agoHiding something legal. In a trivial example, you might not want your spouse to know what present you've bought them before unwrapping it. Or more corporate, you don't want your competitors to know details of your next project.
- seydor 4y agopaying for abortions
- sershe 4y agoThere's a simple response for "what use other than breaking the law does this have" - most, if not all, of mankind, leave under tyrannical, unfair, inane laws (from outright dictatorships, to e.g. drug prohibition). A way to ignore such laws can be a good thing.
- ctvo 4y ago> A way to ignore such laws can be a good thing. There are groups who think property rights are inane and tyrannical. One way to ignore those laws is breaking and entering. Is it only a good thing when it conveniently aligns with what you consider inane and tyrannical?
- sershe 4y agoYep, more or less! If I argue for equality based on some abstract principle and someone else argues women should not be allowed to drive alone because that's against god's will, we have no common basis to argue. So it's "the ones I consider", more or less. Still, we could both agree that e.g. a law prosecuting a private practice of religion is tyrannical and tools to bypass it are good to have. What is your position? That tools primarily intended to break any law are inherently suspect and it's good to ban them?
- ctvo 4y ago> What is your position? That tools primarily intended to break any law are inherently suspect and it's good to ban them? I think a tool's primary use is important. And that's nuanced, and subjective. Let's take guns for example. Guns are regulated in most western countries, some more heavily than others. Gun advocates often cite needing them to hunt animals or to defend themselves from predatory animals in rural environments. Sometimes they also cite using them to defend themselves against other humans. Mostly though guns seem to be used for self harm and to shoot others. In a more tyrannical setting, guns could be used for revolution and to overthrow oppressors. I assume you're OK with things like banning assault rifles for civilian use in your country even though that use case is a possibility elsewhere in the world? When Tornado Cash's primary uses are speculation, tax evasion, and money laundering in a country like the US -- I don't disagree that it should be banned or heavily regulated even if in some specific setting it could possibly be used for other purposes. A lot of folks in the west very loudly cite Tornado Cash (and other things in the crypto space) as a means for oppressed peoples to bypass government control. I wonder if they're not similar to the people who want to own an AK-47 because they sometimes like to hunt ducks or want to protect themselves from home invasions.
- splix 4y agoImagine a person who lives in a dictatorship country and used it to send a donation to an opposition journalist. Because otherwise he would go straight to jail. Is it a good use of such a service or bad? I personally think that's the point of privacy. To protect people from the government. Otherwise it easily becomes a tyranny if they have a full control and visibility over the citizens.
- acdha 4y agoIt’s extremely irresponsible to suggest someone use cryptocurrency in such an environment. The public ledger is a godsend for the secret police giving them evidence for retroactive prosecution and good odds de-anonymizing people, receiving funds from a notorious money laundering site could be used to persecute the journalist, statistically nobody has adequate opsec to conceal their use of these applications, and having sent them tokens would obligate them to take on additional risk converting them into something useful. Cash is much safer because the risk is only at the time of transfer.
- splix 4y agoMaybe it's irresponsible, but so far is the best working approach. How you send the cash, btw? By mail? How do you ensure that post office is not going to learn who is the sender of the envelope with cash?
- acdha 4y agoSomething with that many serious problems can’t be best even if you have a profit motive to pretend otherwise. Re: cash - if you think about the problems I listed, you can see how it’s better in each case, all stemming back from not creating a permanent public ledger of potentially risky activities.
- imustbeevil 4y agoThe US has financial laws. Enforcing those laws is not tyranny. The simplest way to understand this is that money from crime is tracked so that investigators can follow it to the bad guys. We have laws that financial providers have to keep records so we can find the bad guys. A tool whose explicit exclusive purpose is to obfuscate bad guys money will not satisfy the legal requirements of operating financial services in the US. No one should be surprised by this.
- ETH_start 4y agoThat is a very exceptionalist view of the US. Imagine if a Chinese national said: "China has financial laws. Enforcing those laws is not tyranny" to justify an incredible government over-reach into what any one in the world may publish, and how any one in the world may encrypt their digital financial transactions. >>The simplest way to understand this is that money from crime is tracked so that investigators can follow it to the bad guys. While there is abundant evidence that these laws impose massive costs on law-abiding citizens and companies, there is little to no evidence that they are effective at reducing crime: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/25741292.2020.1725366 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/25741292.2020.1... They do support the burgeoning regulatory compliance industry though.
- Etheryte 4y agoThis person does not live in the US, why should they be subject to US laws?
- 4y ago