The Fiscal Information and Analysis Service (FIOD) from the Netherlands stated it arrested a 29-year-old man in Amsterdam on suspicion of “concealing criminal financial flows” and “facilitating money washing” through crypto mixing service Tornado Cash.
The “developer” is introduced prior to the analyzing judge and “multiple arrests aren’t eliminated,” the FIOD stated.
As reported, now, Tornado Cash was placed by the federal government around the OFAC sanctions list.
The FIOD added this service and also the Financial Advanced Cyber Team (FACT) began a criminal analysis against Tornado Cash earlier this June.
“It’s suspected that persons behind this organization make large-scale profits,” the FIOD added.
Tornado Funds are an online currency mixer that runs using the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain and facilitates anonymous transactions by obfuscating their origin, destination, and counterparties, thus growing privacy of their users. Tornado mixes transactions before transmitting these to their individual recipients.
The United States Department from the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) claims that Tornado Cash has been utilized to launder greater than USD 7bn price of virtual currency since its creation in 2019.
Meanwhile, US-based blockchain analysis company Chainalysis contended that, since becoming active in August 2019, Tornado Cash has gotten over USD 7.6bn price of ETH, “a big part of that have originate from illicit or high-risk sources.”
Per their report,
“1 / 2 of individuals funds originated from DeFi protocols, but 18% originated from sanctioned entities (almost entirely, we ought to note, before individuals entities were sanctioned), while just below 11% were funds stolen using their company cryptocurrency services and protocols.”
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Reactions:
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Find out more:
– Tornado Cash Ban Blows Winds of Both Division and Unity Through Crypto Community
– Tornado Cash User Is constantly on the Send ETH to Prominent Figures, Buterin Admits He Used the Mixer
– Mixers Receiving ‘More Cryptocurrency than ever before in 2022’ – Chainalysis
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(Updated at 11:25 UTC to explain the suspect is referred to as a “developer,” and much more reactions were added.)
