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[pooya87]

So what is going on with Wasabi's jurisdiction change? dkbit98 was the one who brought that up I think. Since they are now operating from a different jurisdiction or are relocating somewhere else, is there any noteworthy news that this censorship drama will be dropped? They have not yet (to our knowledge) started censoring any "dirty" coins. I am not sure they will ever regain their reputation or the lost community trust but it doesn't seem like they are trying either.   

Exactly. The lost reputation is not recoverable. Specially since the problem wasn't just the censorship, it was them being shady about it and the fact that they didn't show any kind of hesitation or resistance against implementing such privacy violating actions. That means even if they didn't "censor dirty coins" they can still continue working with the chain analysis companies to deanonymize mixed coins without users knowledge!

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[n0nce]

So what is going on with Wasabi's jurisdiction change? dkbit98 was the one who brought that up I think. Since they are now operating from a different jurisdiction or are relocating somewhere else, is there any noteworthy news that this censorship drama will be dropped? They have not yet (to our knowledge) started censoring any "dirty" coins. I am not sure they will ever regain their reputation or the lost community trust but it doesn't seem like they are trying either.   

Exactly. The lost reputation is not recoverable. Specially since the problem wasn't just the censorship, it was them being shady about it and the fact that they didn't show any kind of hesitation or resistance against implementing such privacy violating actions. That means even if they didn't "censor dirty coins" they can still continue working with the chain analysis companies to deanonymize mixed coins without users knowledge!

Regarding the argument that 'they have not blacklisted anything yet!', I just wrote elsewhere. For all we know, they might already be sharing each and every single CoinJoin input with their blockchain analysis company, just either ignoring their opinions about UTXOs or they might be all coming out green for now. Or the red percentage is just very low so there are no reported cases of blacklisting.

That does not mean that user inputs are not already shared with their blockchain analysis company, though!

The problem is not that your input can get declined; in that case, you take another one and call it a day, sure. And if they don't do it yet at all, even better.
What we don't know is whether they're already sharing UTXOs with external companies before each and every CoinJoin. There has been no confirmation or denial of this information, yet.

Not only the blacklisting update itself should have been disturbing enough, but also the fact they had to specifically mention the first CoinJoin not to have blacklisting enabled as a promotional offer.

Wanna become part of the first ever Wasabi 2.0 main net CoinJoin?

There’s no UTXO filtering, the minimum amount to join is 0.00005 BTC, small amounts don’t pay a coordination fee.

Imagine 'there is no UTXO filtering' is used like some sort of 'goodie' or 'specialty' *just today!*-type deal.. Of a privacy wallet. Sir, I can send any UTXO to anyone, on any day of the week (not just when Wasabi is holding a 'special event'), by just using a different wallet. You're living in a different universe.

[Wind_FURY]

You're right, there are no "guarantees", but nopara73 also can't just wait for a government agency to sanction WasabiWallet, and have the police come to his home and arrest him. He accepted the trade-off to keep Wasabi's pool "untainted", and probably hope that he doesn't get arrested.

I feel like you are trying to justify the wrongdoings of the Wasabi team

Ser, you do know that Wasabi's coordinator is CENTRALIZED, right? We have the right to criticize, and have our own personal opinions about, but the point is it's a centralized service that decided to accept the trade-off.

If ChipMixer, a centralized service, also decided to accept the trade-off, it would personally be OK for me, because I accept that being a centralized service, they have their own right to decide which path to take the service to the future.

But he only had two paths, shut Wasabi down, or block tainted outputs. He chose to block tainted outputs.

He could have handed over the project to someone else (it is open source after all) who is not under the same possible threat so that they could continue the project. Or at the very least they could introduce more decentralized option into the project and most importantly be clear about the anti-privacy things their own coordinator server is doing.
Guess what, if they did that they would have stopped making money!!!

He could have.

Other  developers could also fork the coordinator without the filter.

[NotATether]

But he only had two paths, shut Wasabi down, or block tainted outputs. He chose to block tainted outputs.

@Wind_FURY

What makes you think that he couldn't just continue the project while brazenly ignoring the threats?

Considering how much money Wasabi had to splash on a signature campaign (and possibly advertise in other places as well), that should cover some portion of a lawsuit against those threatening actors.

He would at least be as respected as Ross Ulbricht.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Ser, you do know that Wasabi's coordinator is CENTRALIZED, right? We have the right to criticize, and have our own personal opinions about, but the point is it's a centralized service that decided to accept the trade-off.

It's a centralized entity, which has decided to make CoinJoins in a centralized way. JoinMarket is also run by a few developers, but their strategy is to decentralize CoinJoining. That, and the fact that they believe they're the holy grace of anonymity for the Bitcoin network gives me the impression that they're either foolish or just ill-intentioned.

That being said, I also don't believe there was a trade-off to begin with, and I've made it clear apparently.

[pooya87]

~ that decided to accept the trade-off.

You are belittling their cooperation with anti-privacy organizations to deanonymize their own service by calling it a "trade-off"!

If ChipMixer, a centralized service, also decided to accept the trade-off, it would personally be OK for me, because I accept that being a centralized service, they have their own right to decide which path to take the service to the future.

The problem is that when mixers do what you are calling a "trade-off" they stop being useful because they would no longer be mixing anything anymore.

[Poker Player]

WasabiWallet.io sig campaign is currently on hold. It seems they are going to spend a lot of money for another campaign (and another kind of campaing it seems to me), as icopress has explained.

[Pmalek]

What makes you think that he couldn't just continue the project while brazenly ignoring the threats?

They have stated in their announcements that there were no threats. There was no pressure from any government agency to start blacklisting anything. They were not given a deadline to start blacklisting UTXOs or face sanctions otherwise. It was their decision to take this route. That's what they said at least. They might be lying about not being put under pressure, but I don't see why they would do that unless it's part of a deal. At least if a government agency came knocking on their door, they could use that as a bad excuse. The way things stand right now, they have no excuse and they started all this drama on their own.   

[n0nce]

What makes you think that he couldn't just continue the project while brazenly ignoring the threats?

They have stated in their announcements that there were no threats. There was no pressure from any government agency to start blacklisting anything. They were not given a deadline to start blacklisting UTXOs or face sanctions otherwise. It was their decision to take this route. That's what they said at least. They might be lying about not being put under pressure, but I don't see why they would do that unless it's part of a deal. At least if a government agency came knocking on their door, they could use that as a bad excuse. The way things stand right now, they have no excuse and they started all this drama on their own.   

This is pure speculation, but if I'm honest, I don't fully buy it that there were no threats. They declared it repeatedly and I do hold them accountable for that, but in other circumstances (Twitter comments and such) I get the feeling they're not 100% honest. If it was part of the deal to lie about it, statements like 'otherwise we had to shut it down' make more sense.

[DireWolfM14]

What makes you think that he couldn't just continue the project while brazenly ignoring the threats?

They have stated in their announcements that there were no threats. There was no pressure from any government agency to start blacklisting anything. They were not given a deadline to start blacklisting UTXOs or face sanctions otherwise. It was their decision to take this route. That's what they said at least. They might be lying about not being put under pressure, but I don't see why they would do that unless it's part of a deal. At least if a government agency came knocking on their door, they could use that as a bad excuse. The way things stand right now, they have no excuse and they started all this drama on their own.    

This is pure speculation, but if I'm honest, I don't fully buy it that there were no threats. They declared it repeatedly and I do hold them accountable for that, but in other circumstances (Twitter comments and such) I get the feeling they're not 100% honest. If it was part of the deal to lie about it, statements like 'otherwise we had to shut it down' make more sense.

I'm not so quick to doubt the Wasabi team that there were no "threats."  From my personal experience with the feds, they don't play the bad-cop roll and they don't lead with threats.  Usually they play the long game, and try to get folks to comply on their own.  If nopara73 was contacted by the feds, I would be willing to wager that he wouldn't describe the encounter as "threatening."  Of course this is all pure speculation, there's no evidence the feds did contact Wasabi.

[OROBTC]

...

Ah, it's really too bad that wasabi decided to betray those of us interested in privacy.  Their new coinjoin tool would have otherwise been very nice, flexible inputs.

mempool.space just added a new graphic to each TX (a diagram of each input & output).  Take a look at this likely coinjoin (thanks again to witcher_sense for the script to find likely coinjoins [1]):

https://mempool.space/tx/62c3fbd39790cc8157ac4a704700b0398f0b385f96589cf2b77b937a09e0fdce


[1] https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=time(desc)&q=input_count(50..),output_count(58..),time(2022-06-26..),version(1)#f=hash,input_count,output_count,time,fee_usd,output_total,output_total_usd,version

[Poker Player]

...

Ah, it's really too bad that wasabi decided to betray those of us interested in privacy.  Their new coinjoin tool would have otherwise been very nice, flexible inputs.

mempool.space just added a new graphic to each TX (a diagram of each input & output).  Take a look at this likely coinjoin (thanks again to witcher_sense for the script to find likely coinjoins [1]):

https://mempool.space/tx/62c3fbd39790cc8157ac4a704700b0398f0b385f96589cf2b77b937a09e0fdce


[1] https://blockchair.com/bitcoin/transactions?s=time(desc)&q=input_count(50..),output_count(58..),time(2022-06-26..),version(1)#f=hash,input_count,output_count,time,fee_usd,output_total,output_total_usd,version

Any explanation for Dummies? I am not clear whether you mean that coinjoin is a breach of privacy or that it is nice because of the flexible inputs.

[dkbit98]

Anyone saw this report from one customer of Gemini exchange who received message about his usage of Wasabi wallet?
He was Gemini customer for years without any problems, but they just him a message and told him that he was using Wasabi for mixing in last two years.
Now they are asking from him to explain purpose of his transactions and how he is using Gemini for this, and they closed his account in the end.
I never used Gemini and I don't have account there, but watch out if you are using it like this.


https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/xqs8uw/i_had_zero_issues_with_gemini_for_years_thought/


https://rimgo.bus-hit.me/a/ZyK2JeK

[o_e_l_e_o]

So much for Wasabi's coinjoin being compatible with centralized exchanges. This completely destroys that argument. And also note Gemini repeating the lie that everyone who wants privacy must be doing something illegal.

What a shitshow. Avoid all centralized exchanges, and avoid Wasabi.

[Pmalek]

Back when I asked centralized exchanges what their stance is on "taint", Gemini was one of the few sites that provided some useful information. They are US based and surely more "strict" than some competitors.

- If the funds originate from gambling activities, you aren't welcome.
- If you attempt to hide the origin of your money, you aren't welcome.

#7 Gemini   

Gemini was the first exchange that said something meaningful. If the coins originate from gambling, they can’t be deposited and used on Gemini. They analyze their customers' transactions to ensure they don’t come from casinos and sportsbooks because if they do, the accounts will be closed according to their support. Attempts to “conceal” the origin is not allowed. That probably means moving them around a bit between your own addresses or maybe mixing them.

[NotATether]

Back when I asked centralized exchanges what their stance is on "taint", Gemini was one of the few sites that provided some useful information. They are US based and surely more "strict" than some competitors.

- If the funds originate from gambling activities, you aren't welcome.
- If you attempt to hide the origin of your money, you aren't welcome.

Makes me tad bit more safer with using Gemini, as long as everything is verified. But I'd imagine Binance also blocks centralized mixers since there was an incident where coins were temporarily confiscated for using (ironically) WabiSabi to mix the coins.

[n0nce]

Back when I asked centralized exchanges what their stance is on "taint", Gemini was one of the few sites that provided some useful information. They are US based and surely more "strict" than some competitors.

- If the funds originate from gambling activities, you aren't welcome.
- If you attempt to hide the origin of your money, you aren't welcome.

Makes me tad bit more safer with using Gemini, as long as everything is verified. But I'd imagine Binance also blocks centralized mixers since there was an incident where coins were temporarily confiscated for using (ironically) WabiSabi to mix the coins.

Why does it make you safer with using Gemini knowing they can confiscate your funds any time, by simply pretending they come from a mixer (even if they don't), or 'originate' from gambling sites (even if you don't gamble)?

[NotATether]

Why does it make you safer with using Gemini knowing they can confiscate your funds any time, by simply pretending they come from a mixer (even if they don't), or 'originate' from gambling sites (even if you don't gamble)?

Replace Gemini with any reputable exchange, the same point applies also for them.

They'd lose a lot of business if they did that with any random Joe, because 1) pretending by means of a human analysis is time consuming and costs millions of dollars eventually, hence why them sticking with an algorithm is cheaper, and 2) pretending without bothering to do an analysis at all would make them a scam, and all customers would be chasing them down everywhere like 1xbit if this is what they were doing.

Ultimately, it's only those exchanges that do no analysis or a human analysis with BS rules from their compliance department (and since that is expensive, it means they're in for an exit scam) that are going to be pretending that your funds come from gambling or mixed.

Of course, Bisq is the safest, but it's nice knowing that not everyone else is a highwayman waiting to rob you.


By the way, how are those Wasabi download numbers doing? What about their advertising? They've been pretty quiet for a while.

[BlackHatCoiner]

They'd lose a lot of business if they did that with any random Joe

Except that they already do, and lose minimum business? They don't make it seem an extraordinary claim, but that's what Binance, Coinbase, Kraken, Gemini etc., all essentially do. If we take the crazy assumption that taint analysis isn't pointless and violative, then the term that you'll have your funds confiscated if the indefinite algorithm says so doesn't sound pointless and violative either.

pretending without bothering to do an analysis at all would make them a scam

Let's take Gemini as an example. From their user agreement page:

As such, we have a Gambling Policy that prohibits the use of Gemini for storing, sending, or receiving wagers or proceeds of Illegal Gambling. Proceeds derived from trading contracts for differences and spread bets on licensed and regulated platforms do not constitute Illegal Gambling or a violation of our Gambling Policy. We employ a number of methods to detect violations of our Gambling Policy.

You agree and understand that we have the right to immediately (i) suspend your account and any related account, (ii) freeze/lock the funds and assets in all such accounts, and (iii) suspend your access to Gemini, if we suspect, in our sole discretion, any such accounts to be in violation of our Gambling Policy, which is a direct violation of this User Agreement.

From Pmalek's "What Do Centralized Exchanges Consider as Taint?" thread, this is what Gemini responded:

Translation: We, Gemini, have every right to shut down your account, confiscate your property if we suspect your coins come from illegal gambling activity. We have a number of methods to detect such activity, but we're not going to reveal them. Your coins might come from such activity, and you might not even know it. In any case, your account will be closed.

[Agbe]

From Pmalek's "What Do Centralized Exchanges Consider as Taint?" thread, this is what Gemini responded:

Translation: We, Gemini, have every right to shut down your account, confiscate your property if we suspect your coins come from illegal gambling activity. We have a number of methods to detect such activity, but we're not going to reveal them. Your coins might come from such activity, and you might not even know it. In any case, your account will be closed.

That is nice but when Gemini detect that the coins comes from illegal gambling platform and they (Gemini) close the account. Then what will happen to the coins in the wallet? Are they (the coins) going to lost forever or Gemini would return the coins back to the source?  My question is, what will happen to the coin that is in the wallet?