American authorities ease sanctions on Tornado Cash crypto mixer

Thanks to new guidelines from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, legitimate users of the Tornado Cash crypto mixer can reclaim their funds from the platform.

Thanks to new guidelines from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, legitimate users of the Tornado Cash crypto mixer can reclaim their funds from the platform.

The U.S. Treasury is publishing new guidelines for its controversial Tornado Cash sanctions. as reported by Cryptobriefing. US legal users can now apply for a license with OFAC - a subdivision of the Treasury Department - to withdraw their funds from the platform.

It also says that it is not illegal to work with the open source code. That means: users may copy it, share it, and include it in publications. Visiting the website is not prohibited either. OFAC sanctioned Tornado Cash on August 8, 2022, freezing all user funds and making its use illegal.

The accusation was that the platform was mainly used by North Korean and Russian hacker groups to launder money. The case sparked a buzz in the sector. Many prominent crypto figures stuck to the sanctions, but publicly criticized the decision very sharply, including Circle’s CEO, the second-largest stablecoin issuer.

The sanction was an attack on privacy rights in Web3.0 and a historic, unique decision, critics say. Never before had a smart contract been banned. The founder of the platform was arrested shortly after in the Netherlands. Rumors said he cooperated with Russian intelligence services. Coinbase recently even supported lawsuits against OFAC by affected victims.