3 ms·

This is clearly wrong. No one has said you can't distribute the TC source code. What you can't do is run a money laundering service with it. And the vast majo

• concordDance 4y ago
  > No one has said you can't distribute the TC source code. So github removed it for no reason?
  • ohgodplsno 4y ago
    GitHub removed it because if you're a US company, you'd rather err on safety and cut all contact with not just the blacklisted company itself but everything related to it, because there is nothing worse than the US Financial Services looking into you. In the same way that if you ask me to keep a bag and I learn two days later you've been arrested for murder, I'm definitely not keeping that bag, even if the bag itself isn't accused of murder.
• whatisweb3 4y ago
  > No one has said you can't distribute the TC source code. The government has explicitly said that all property and interests in property of Tornado Cash, and anybody found to be supporting it it any way, is blocked. This is why GitHub and all hosting services will refuse to allow it on their platforms. If you try to publish TC source code, you could be considered aiding the blocked persons, and face up to 30 years in jail. If you build a new implementation of the same or similar protocol, you might also be putting yourself at risk. > And the vast majority of TC transactions seem to have been exactly that - ways of hiding crypto from tax offices. The vast majority of TC transactions are for privacy. How much of that is evading tax offices or illegal money laundering is less clear. Estimates put it in the 10-20% range[1]. There are many users that would like to use TC but have avoided it because of the lack of regulatory clarity. Had the US government instead come out saying specifically that TC-style privacy on blockchain is a right that all users should be entitled to, the rates of non-criminal activity would probably be much higher than 80-90%. > A better comparison is the Phantom Secure sting This is a poor comparison. Phantom Secure was not an open source E2EE protocol like Tornado Cash or Matrix - it was a private company and network led by a single individual who profited immensely by selling devices to known criminals. If you think TC is comparable to Phantom Secure, then Matrix and Tor should also be comparable to Phantom Secure, but of course that is a bad comparison. [1] https://twitter.com/bantg/status/1557053714405490691 https://twitter.com/bantg/status/1557053714405490691
• ETH_start 4y ago
  >>What you can't do is run a money laundering service with it. And the vast majority of TC transactions seem to have been exactly that - ways of hiding crypto from tax offices. This is a completely baseless allegation, that seems to rely on nothing more than the assumption that seeking privacy is an indication of criminal intent. It's the kind of logic used to rationalize dragnet surveillance programs that do away with privacy rights. >>A better comparison is the Phantom Secure sting, where a network that was used for primarily criminal purposes was shutdown. That's completely incomparable. That was a service to sell bug-proof phones, not the phone itself, and the service was expressly marketed to criminals to avoid police surveillance. The police infiltrated the service and bugged the phones. The Matrix example, where a generic privacy tool is outright banned, is far more comparable.