The Stanford Blockchain Membership has issued a scathing critique of the US Division of Justice's (DOJ) prosecution of Twister Money builders Roman Storm and Roman Semenov, calling them an overreach of outdated federal information transmission legal guidelines. cash.
In its report, titled “Twister Money and the Boundaries of Cash Transmission,” the membership challenged the DOJ's use of 18 USC § 1960, a statute geared toward unlicensed cash transmitting companies, to cost builders with Twister Money, a decentralized Ethereum. based mostly protocol.
The 2023 DOJ indictment labeled Twister Money an “unlicensed cash switch enterprise” for permitting customers to anonymize crypto transactions.
The Stanford Blockchain Membership argued that the legislation, written earlier than the appearance of blockchain expertise, fails to handle the nuances of decentralized protocols like Twister Money, which function by means of immutable sensible contracts, with out intermediaries or custodians.
Based on the report:
“The DOJ's aggressive enforcement of 18 USC § 1960 raises broader questions in regards to the dangers of increasing statutory language to cowl new applied sciences. This strategy invitations unelected officers and the judiciary to overstep their constitutional bounds, circumventing Congress’ energy to legislate.”
The report emphasizes the constitutional implications of utilizing government legislation enforcement to manage rising applied sciences. He warned that such actions circumvent the democratic course of and threat stifling innovation by complicated cases of authorized use of privateness instruments with illicit actions.
Stanford College, identified for its management in authorized and technological innovation, has traditionally confronted complicated regulatory challenges. The blockchain membership report continues this custom by addressing the stress between privateness rights and regulatory oversight in digital finance.
The Twister Money case highlights a rising debate over monetary privateness and the chance of those new applied sciences being misused by unhealthy actors.
Advocates, together with the Stanford Blockchain Membership, argue that protocols comparable to Twister Money meet reputable privateness wants by permitting people to guard their identities throughout transactions. On the identical time, critics say these instruments facilitate cash laundering and different unlawful actions.
The discharge of the report marks a big contribution to ongoing discussions about how the US authorized system can adapt to DeFi applied sciences. It stays to be seen whether or not the judiciary will heed these criticisms because it continues to grapple with the complexities of blockchain regulation.
