Jack Recider

And yeah, a bunch of people were running these mixers and were caught by the police and arrested for running unlicensed money transmitters. And the police were able to shut down those services. The difference here is very important. A custodial mixer is where you give your money to some person to hold for when you want it back.

And yeah, a bunch of people were running these mixers and were caught by the police and arrested for running unlicensed money transmitters. And the police were able to shut down those services. The difference here is very important. A custodial mixer is where you give your money to some person to hold for when you want it back.

While a non-custodial mixer, the money is held on the blockchain, not in anyone's possession. Kind of like if you just stashed your money in a locker somewhere, and then you gave the key to someone else and they got it out. The place that owned those lockers had no idea what you put in there, so they can't be held liable for whatever was in there. Kind of like a dead drop.

While a non-custodial mixer, the money is held on the blockchain, not in anyone's possession. Kind of like if you just stashed your money in a locker somewhere, and then you gave the key to someone else and they got it out. The place that owned those lockers had no idea what you put in there, so they can't be held liable for whatever was in there. Kind of like a dead drop.

Now, I imagine the makers of Tornado Cash saw that custodial mixers had been shut down and arrested in the past. And they probably knew full well that a service like this might be abused by people. So Tornado Cash developers were like, we have to be absolutely certain that we're never in possession of anyone's money ever. We can never have custody since those kind of mixers are illegal.

Now, I imagine the makers of Tornado Cash saw that custodial mixers had been shut down and arrested in the past. And they probably knew full well that a service like this might be abused by people. So Tornado Cash developers were like, we have to be absolutely certain that we're never in possession of anyone's money ever. We can never have custody since those kind of mixers are illegal.

So it's only with the invention of smart contracts that they were able to make a service like this. that they could be completely hands-off, a service that nobody was operating or running. It was headless. And the developers could never touch anyone's money, even if they wanted. It was coded that way. In no way, shape, or form are they ever in possession of anyone's money.

So it's only with the invention of smart contracts that they were able to make a service like this. that they could be completely hands-off, a service that nobody was operating or running. It was headless. And the developers could never touch anyone's money, even if they wanted. It was coded that way. In no way, shape, or form are they ever in possession of anyone's money.

And they went to great lengths to prove that. Not only that, they wanted this thing to be extremely resilient and impossible to be taken down, as they felt that privacy tools like this were very important to people. Also, a lot of these mixers in the past were tailored for criminals. So Alphabay, for example, was a darknet marketplace where people could buy and sell illegal items.

And they went to great lengths to prove that. Not only that, they wanted this thing to be extremely resilient and impossible to be taken down, as they felt that privacy tools like this were very important to people. Also, a lot of these mixers in the past were tailored for criminals. So Alphabay, for example, was a darknet marketplace where people could buy and sell illegal items.

Well, the site had its own crypto mixer specifically designed to help you hide your illegal purchases. And in the world of cybercrime, intention matters. If you are building something specifically for criminals to conduct crimes with, that's racketeering, and you could get RICO charges against you. But the developers of Tornado Cash held on strong that this was a privacy tool.

Well, the site had its own crypto mixer specifically designed to help you hide your illegal purchases. And in the world of cybercrime, intention matters. If you are building something specifically for criminals to conduct crimes with, that's racketeering, and you could get RICO charges against you. But the developers of Tornado Cash held on strong that this was a privacy tool.

That was their point. And to make that clear, they didn't hide in the shadows of the dark net. They were open about their service and made it easily accessible. I mean, they even had a Twitter account and a normal website, which all clearly said, this is a way to have private transactions on Ethereum.

That was their point. And to make that clear, they didn't hide in the shadows of the dark net. They were open about their service and made it easily accessible. I mean, they even had a Twitter account and a normal website, which all clearly said, this is a way to have private transactions on Ethereum.

So as you can see, as a person who values my own privacy, I found this tool to be helpful and important. Decentralization is very fascinating to me too. My website, darknightdiaries.com, is hosted on a single server somewhere. But Tornado Cash was kept up by hundreds of thousands of people running Ethereum validators. And there's something amazing and beautiful about that.

So as you can see, as a person who values my own privacy, I found this tool to be helpful and important. Decentralization is very fascinating to me too. My website, darknightdiaries.com, is hosted on a single server somewhere. But Tornado Cash was kept up by hundreds of thousands of people running Ethereum validators. And there's something amazing and beautiful about that.

We can put something on the blockchain and you know it'll permanently be there as long as Ethereum exists.

We can put something on the blockchain and you know it'll permanently be there as long as Ethereum exists.

Well, clearly, I wasn't the only one to use Tornado Cash. The people who stole the $600 million from Axie Infinity also noticed Tornado Cash and sent hundreds of millions of dollars to it.

Well, clearly, I wasn't the only one to use Tornado Cash. The people who stole the $600 million from Axie Infinity also noticed Tornado Cash and sent hundreds of millions of dollars to it.