I would object that you have evidence that Tornado Cash was created with the goal of facilitating crime. Sure they knew it would facilitate crime, just like th

I would object that you have evidence that Tornado Cash was created with the goal of facilitating crime. Sure they knew it would facilitate crime, just like the roads do, but we don't know that was the goal (and I doubt it was). >Tornado Cash’s design does not comply with legal requirements in many countries. As far as I know there were plenty of legal reasons for many people to use Tornado Cash, probably even Americans (up until it was sanctioned). One example is a legally owned "cold wallet" being firewalled from a hot wallet. It's not wrong to create something that may be used illegally some (or even most) of the time or some of the places. >his paycheck is not in any way coming directly – note how your very next sentence directly contradicts this assertion – If that's your assertion, then the person selling gasoline to the mobsters is culpable then, knowing that mobsters buy gas and knowing that gas facilitates crime, but doing nothing to specifically check if someone is a mobster before selling the gas. > purpose of the tax is criminal, and nobody working on the project thinks their goal is to facilitate crime. But that's precisely my point as well. You can operate or design a mixer without the goal of facilitate crime, even with the knowledge it will. The purpose of profiting may be to profit off of legitimate users using the mixer, and the unfortunate byproduct is bad people sometimes use a service for ill despite you not intending for that to happen. Now I can't prove intent, but I doubt you can either. >paycheck is not in any way coming directly A second point -- your problem is that it went directly and not through an intermediary? OK, so it would have been fine if a cousin or whatever set up a shell company and then paid them through the shell company, then it would be indirect. I don't buy that an extra layer of indirection somehow makes it better. Mobster paying tax (or shell company) and that tax (or shell company tranfer) going to you is a mobster paying, with an extra step. I mean Tornado cash is doing an analogous thing to what's happening with tax money -- the users may or may not be doing illegal things but the people getting paid out of the 'mixer' of the tax treasury are getting a mix of good and mobster money. You could argue taxation is in part just a way of money laundering to profit off of mobsters and crimes. Of course the difference here is with tax money, there really is the provable intent make money directly from crime. Even if someone informs the IRS their source of money is criminal in the same envelope the money is in, IRS will happily take 100% criminal money with full intent for the coffers to directly profit off the crime.