The Swan Bitcoin platform has warned its users that, in accordance with new FinCEN regulations, the penalty for direct use of crypto mixers will be a permanent lock on their accounts.
The Swan Bitcoin team emphasized that such actions are not desirable in their view and are the result of forced measures. One of the co-founders of Swan Bitcoin, Yan Pritzker, stated that the U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) is pressuring the platform to block the accounts of customers using crypto mixers.
Pritzker emphasized, “We believe that using mixers is normal, confidentiality is not a crime, and using unmixed crypto assets is akin to bringing your entire salary to a store to pay for just one apple. People should have the right to exchange that salary for individual bills before spending it, to avoid disclosing their income size to the clerk.”
The company also noted that in compliance with FinCEN requirements, its banking and custodial partners have refused to serve customers directly interacting with crypto mixers and are obligated to freeze suspicious accounts due to the threat of license withdrawal.
Pritzker believes that the political climate and pressure from U.S. regulators on participants in the crypto industry have caused significant fear in the banking sector, which refuses to deal with anything related to cryptocurrency. Swan Bitcoin’s CEO, Cory Klippensten, recommended that customers using crypto mixers do not withdraw funds directly from the platform to the mixer, as there is a risk that the company’s banking partners will block them.
Earlier, Gary T. Schwartz Professor of Law at the University of California, Eugene Volokh, expressed the opinion that blocking the use of the Tornado Cash crypto mixer for anonymizing transactions in the United States does not contradict the country’s laws and citizens’ rights.