A recently released report claims that Uniswap, a decentralized exchange (dex), has blocked approximately 253 addresses who are allegedly linked to criminal activity or sanctions. The information was discovered by the software developer Banteg who analyzed and saved the shared logs from Uniswap’s server.
Out of 253 Blocked Addresses, 30 are ENS Domain Names and Uniswap labels.
Banteg, a software developer and contributor to Yearn Finance, published “An Overview of Yearn Finance” on August 19. Twitter threadIt claims that the dex Uniswap blocks 253 bitcoin addresses. “Uniswap has provided an unusual level of transparency,” Banteg said in regard to “frontend censoring via TRM Labs.” Uniswap partnered with TRM Labs in mid-April and the firm blacklists crypto addresses that may be associated with sanctions and crypto crimes.
It was the same month. ReportsIt appeared that a few innocent Uniswap customers were being identified. affectedTRM Labs’s front end. At the time, no one was sure about exactly how many crypto addresses were blacklisted by Uniswap’s TRM Labs-gated front end. Banteg asserts that there are 253 addressesThere are 30 addresses that use ENS domain names. Developer also mentioned that there are two types of risk factors and seven categories.
“Both ownership and being a counterparty of a ‘bad’ address are checked and can contribute to blocking,” Banteg wrote. According to Banteg, the data “wasn’t meant to be public” but the developer noted that people could still have an “exclusive look at the very first [TRM Labs] leak, courtesy of Uniswap.”
Smart Contracts and code are defined, not the web platforms that host them
Follow the news for more information Tornado Cash banned by U.S. GovernmentThis is the protocol to mix ethereum using Coinjoin or ZKsnark technology. An open-source developer of Tornado Cash emerged after Tornado Cash’s ban. ArrestGithub’s code is erased, Tornado Cash Github codebase contributors were suspended, and the project’s Discord server was Removed.
However, the non-profit that focuses on policy issues facing crypto assets, Coin Center, believes the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC) “overstepped its legal authority.” Coin Center is researching the legalities of the Tornado Cash ban and plans to “engage” with OFAC to discuss the matter.
While Uniswap has been updating its TRM Labs-gated front end, there’s likely a whole lot more crypto companies and decentralized finance (defi) protocols following the same measures. Banteg was one example. revealedThe Centre Consortium, a stablecoin issuer run by Circle Financial and Coinbase Global blacklisted 75,000 USDC belonging to Tornado Cash users.
“I think this is the first case when a pool has been frozen and not an individual account,” Banteg said at the time.
The issues surrounding Tornado Cash and the precautions taken by defi teams like Uniswap, expose the underlying weakness in so-called ‘decentralized finance’ protocols and whether or not they truly are decentralized.
Tornado Cash developers even blacklisted an OFAC indicted ethereum adress using a Chainalysis/oracle contract, long before Tornado Cash banned by the U.S. government. Users also criticized Uniswap in July 2021 for blocking more than 100 tokens from their main interface.
In both cases, users of crypto discussed ways they could just leverage Tornado Cash code or Uniswap’s smart contracts and mirror sitesThese restrictions can be bypassed. Uniswap has been registered as a U.S.-based company and its frontend (or website) is owned by the U.S. entity. People may be interested in clarifying that defi portals cannot be decentralized. The only thing that can be considered as such are smart contracts and code.
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