Cryptocurrencies, Survey on Legal Frameworks and Regulation Around the World

Mezquita, Yeray; Pérez, Dévika; González‐Briones, Alfonso; Prieto, Javier

doi:10.1007/978-3-031-21229-1_6

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 27 publications

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“…Despite the many benefits of the technology, cryptocurrency has been criticised for energy usage 1 (Truby 2018;Rudd 2023) and the perceived risk of money laundering (Mahalaxmi and Srinivas 2022;Sun et al 2022;Anthony 2022b;Hossain 2023), fraud (Scharfman 2023b;Sanz-Bas et al 2021), tax evasion (Mezquita et al 2023;Noked 2018), and use in the drug trade (Mezquita et al 2023). 2 Some jurisdictions banned or heavily regulated cryptocurrencies while others have sought to embrace digital assets as a source of innovation (Novak 2020).…”

Section: Background: Cryptocurrency and Blockchain Technologymentioning

confidence: 99%

When Criminals Abuse the Blockchain: Establishing Personal Jurisdiction in a Decentralised Environment

Watters

2023

Laws

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In August of 2022, the United States Department of Treasury sanctioned the virtual currency mixer Tornado Cash, an open-source and fully decentralised piece of software running on the Ethereum blockchain, subsequently leading to the arrest of one of its developers in The Netherlands. Not only was this the first time the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) extended its authority to sanction a foreign ‘person’ to software, but the decentralised nature of the software and global usage highlight the challenge of establishing jurisdiction over decentralised software and its global user base. The government claims jurisdiction over citizens, residents, and any assets that pass through the country’s territory. As a global financial center with most large tech companies, this often facilitates the establishment of jurisdiction over global conduct that passes through US servers. However, decentralised programs on blockchains with nodes located around the world challenge this traditional approach as either nearly all countries can claim jurisdiction over users, subjecting users to criminal laws in countries with which they have no true interaction, or they limit jurisdiction, thereby risking abuse by bad actors. This article takes a comparative approach to examine the challenges to establishing criminal jurisdiction on cryptocurrency-related crimes.

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