"Last week Coinbase, America’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange, proudly announced that it was acquiring Neutrino, a startup focused on blockchain analysis—using public blockchain data to trace cryptocurrency transactions. In its announcement, Coinbase wrote that Neutrino’s technology will help make cryptocurrency “safer and more accessible for people all over the world” by helping track thieves and terrorists. In turn, robust blockchain analytics will help crypto exchanges maintain stable fiat banking relationships and, generally, integrate with mainstream finance.
No wonder, then, that Coinbase says it is “excited to welcome [Neutrino] to the Coinbase family!” But observers on Twitter, including analyst Arjun Balaji, quickly noticed a major problem with Coinbase’s new family members: many of them are former leaders of Hacking Team, an Italian spyware vendor. Though ostensibly a creator of tools to monitor and fight crime and terrorism, Hacking Team also sold those tools to repressive regimes, possibly in violation of international controls on such tools. Those regimes, in turn, used the tools to monitor and endanger journalists, activists, and political dissidents."
No wonder, then, that Coinbase says it is “excited to welcome [Neutrino] to the Coinbase family!” But observers on Twitter, including analyst Arjun Balaji, quickly noticed a major problem with Coinbase’s new family members: many of them are former leaders of Hacking Team, an Italian spyware vendor. Though ostensibly a creator of tools to monitor and fight crime and terrorism, Hacking Team also sold those tools to repressive regimes, possibly in violation of international controls on such tools. Those regimes, in turn, used the tools to monitor and endanger journalists, activists, and political dissidents."