Vitalik Buterin Donates $170K ETH for Tornado Cash Developers' Legal Defense

Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum co-founder, donated heavily to Tornado Cash creators Roman Storm and Alexey Pertsev's legal defense.

According to a December 31 Juicebox project post by “Free Pertsev and Storm,” Buterin paid 50 Ether (ETH), worth $170,000 at the time, to the fund to help engineers facing major legal issues.

Tornado Cash creators get 25% of $650,000 from JusticeDAO, a community-driven effort to support their legal fights.

Buterin had already contributed 100 ETH, worth $240,000, in October, showing his ongoing support for the devs despite fears about government overreach in crypto.

The Tornado Cash crew faced legal issues in 2022 when Dutch police detained Pertsev for money laundering for his bitcoin mixing business.

Storm and developer Roman Semenov were accused with money laundering, sanctions breaches, and fraud by U.S. prosecutors. Storm, freed on bond, will face trial on April 14, while Semenov remains at large.

Tornado Cash was added to OFAC's Specially Designated Nationals list in August 2022, prompting the allegations.

The mixer is accused of laundering over $7 billion in cryptocurrencies, including North Korean hacker funding.

Coin Center and Tornado Cash customers supported by Coinbase have sued the Treasury.

An appeal court decided in November that OFAC had “overstepped” by sanctioning immutable Tornado Cash smart contracts, but the criminal charges against Storm and Pertsev remain unaffected.

Buterin also urged Elon Musk to tone down his X conversations after a fiery argument over US foreign tech workers.

On Dec. 31, Buterin praised Musk's free speech but advised him to “turn down the temperature” on the platform.

Buterin's remarks followed Musk's expletive-filled tweet supporting H1B visa holders, which conservative users said hurts local U.S. workers.

After challenging Musk, several opponents claimed their accounts were withdrawn of premium privileges, claiming censorship.

#Vitalik #ElonMusk #Tornado

💵 Tornado Cash Defense Failed

🆓 U.S. District Judge Katherine Polk Failla of the Southern District of New York dismissed a motion by one of the developers of the crypto-mixer Tornado Cash, Roman Storm, and ruled in favor of the case proceeding.

✔️ Storm and his colleague, Roman Semenov, are accused by U.S. authorities of creating the crypto-mixer for criminal purposes and facilitating the laundering of more than $1 billion in illicit funds.

➡️ The defense argued that writing code should be protected under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, just like free speech.

✔️ However, the judge stated that evading sanctions and money laundering are unrelated to that protection.

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#TornadoCash #tornado

بحيلة ذكية يستعين مخترق سارق للعملات الرقمية !!

تم اختراق المستخدمين من بورصة العملات المشفرة الهندية (وزير إكس - WazirX) و نقل الأموال باستخدام خدمة (تورنادو كاش - Tornado Cash) تسمح خدمة "تورنادو كاش" لمستخدمي العملات المشفرة بتبادل التوكنات مع إخفاء عناوين المحافظ على مختلف سلاسل الكتل. وعلى الرغم من أن الخدمة نفسها ليست مشبوهة، إلا أنها تُستخدم بشكل شائع من قبل مجرمي العملات المشفرة لإخفاء الأدلة الرقمية

وفقًا لبيانات تتبعها شركة (أرخام - Arkham)، نقل المخترق ما يقرب من 4 ملايين دولار من عملة الإيثر (ETH) عبر 16 معاملة على شبكة الإيثيريوم إلى جهاز توجيه "تورنادو كاش".
تشكل الأموال المسروقة أكثر من 45% من إجمالي الاحتياطيات التي ذكرتها البورصة في تقرير يونيو 2024،
صرح المستشارون القانونيون لـ "وزير إكس" يوم الاثنين أن العملاء من غير المرجح أن يستردوا أموالهم بالكامل بالعملات المشفرة، مع أفضل سيناريو هو استعادة ما بين 55% و57% من الأموال. #bitcoin #Binance #etherreum #hacker #tornado $BTC $ETH

曾经隐私币和隐私赛道也是市场上很重要的一个类别和叙事，当年 #zec 上市的时候也创造了一个价格历史记录。但是各国的监管者非常不喜欢隐私币，也对部分项目上了手段，比如抓了 #tornado 的创始人。未来，隐私还会有机会么？
#beam #grin #xmr