Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev has left the prison

Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev was released from prison on February 7th but remains under house arrest while preparing for an appeal. Earlier, a Dutch court suspended the prolonged detention order from August 2022 and extended it until November 2024. Alexey Pertsev was released but still under electronic surveillance. He called it 'not real freedom but better than prison.' The incident raised concerns within the privacy advocacy community, as it could set a dangerous precedent for privacy protection technology and open-source developers.

Pertsev is convicted of money laundering, Tornado Cash fights against US sanctions. The Dutch appellate court sentenced Alexey Pertsev to 5 years and 4 months in prison for money laundering in May 2024, even though he did not control Tornado Cash or the funds through the protocol. OFAC fines Tornado Cash at the same time Pertsev is arrested, accusing the service of laundering over 7 billion USD, including 455 million USD stolen by the Lazarus hacker group of North Korea. In November 2024, the US Federal Appeals Court ruled that OFAC exceeded its jurisdiction in penalizing Tornado Cash's immutable contracts, determining that they are not property and cannot be owned. By January 2025, the Western District of Texas Court overturned the sanctions order, marking a turning point in security and management policies in the United States, setting an important precedent for digital privacy rights.