Open-source software may soon be illegal, as Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev is soliciting money for his legal defense in the Netherlands. Through a video appeal on X, Pertsev is attempting to raise the sum of $750,000 to $1 million in order to pay for his legal representation.
Supporters of the campaign are asked to send Ethereum using Juicebox, a decentralized platform for fundraising. The team supporting Pertsev makes sure to highlight that he is fighting not only for his freedom but also for more general privacy and open-source software development principles.
Over $100,000 was donated by Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, to support Pertsev and Roman Storm, who are being held in detention in the United States.
Concerned about the ramifications for developers should someone abuse their open-source code, privacy advocates and blockchain specialists keep a close eye on Pertsev’s situation.
Head of Block’s Decentralized Identity Daniel Buchner contends that open-source software creators shouldn’t be subject to legal or criminal consequences for the use of their products.
Regulators around the world have increased their scrutiny of privacy protocols, citing the use of these technologies by terrorist organizations and rogue nations such as North Korea to conceal illicit digital assets.
The co-founders of Samourai Wallet are among the cryptocurrency privacy service providers that the US government has filed lawsuits against for allegedly breaking local laws.
The international crypto community has taken a keen interest in Pertsev’s case, considering it to be crucial for the direction of open-source development going forward.
It calls into question the degree of accountability that developers have for the behavior of users of their programs and may establish a precedent that influences developers’ attitudes toward open-source projects and their willingness to work on privacy-related technologies.
