The Treasury and Defense Departments are working to stop North Korean hackers — with little to show for it.
. But I am willing to say the two are caught up in something much bigger than themselves and are likely victims as much as perpetrators.
In other words, the legal action taken against Tornado Cash is bound up in a geopolitical conflict between the U.S. and North Korea. In other other words, both the smart contract itself and the Romans are caught up in a massive U.S. dragnet. This is more lit crit than evidence, but consider the DOJ presser’s dek, that bit under the headline that’s supposed to sum up the story and highlight why it matters: “Concurrent Treasury sanctions and DOJ indictments hold to account founders of mixing service that laundered stolen virtual assets for North Korea.”
Should the Romans get in trouble anyway? Isn’t that quite a dangerous machine they built? And couldn’t they have tried to put in an off switch? To the extent that Russian nationals, Storm and Semenov, broke U.S. law by neglecting the appropriate know-your-customer or anti-money laundering protections and FinCEN “money-transmitting business” registrations then, maybe, sure, there’s enough justification to bring them to trial.
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