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Brian Armstrong says that Neutrino staff with prior connections to controversial software firm Hacking Team will transition out of their new roles at Coinbase.
Brian Armstrong, co-founder and CEO of major United States crypto exchange and wallet Coinbase, has said that Neutrino staff with prior connections to controversial software firm Hacking Team will transition out of their new roles at Coinbase. Armstrong made his announcement in an official blog post published on March 4.
Controversy has surrounded Coinbaseâs recent acquisition of blockchain analytics firm Neutrino, due to the backgrounds of key Neutrino staff at the contentious software outfit Hacking Team. The latter firm is alleged to have provided its surveillance tools to global law enforcement agencies, corporations and governments â with authoritarian regimes allegedly among them.
Responding to the crypto communityâs outcry at the Hacking Team connections, Armstrong has given his official statement, which concedes that âwhile we looked hard at the technology and security of the Neutrino product, we did not properly evaluate everything from the perspective of our mission and values as a crypto company.â He then stated:
âTogether with the Neutrino team [...] [we] have come to an agreement: those who previously worked at Hacking Team (despite the fact that they have no current affiliation with Hacking Team), will transition out of Coinbase.â
The CEO characterized the backstory of the acquisition as a âgap in [Coinbaseâs] due diligence process.â He stated that bringing Neutrinoâs Anti-Money Laundering and Know Your Customer technology and blockchain analytics tools in-house remains of critical importance to Coinbase, which aims to operate as a legally compliant, modernized and regulated platform.
Noting that âBitcoinâââand crypto more generallyâââis about the rights of the individual and about the technological protection of civil liberties,â the CEO conceded that Coinbase had not made âthe right tradeoff in this specific case.â
Ahead of Armstrongâs statement, Christine Sandler â director of institutional sales at Coimbase â had defended the Neutrino acquisition, stating that it was necessary for the exchange to migrate away from its existing blockchain analytics tools providers because they had been selling Coinbase clientsâ data to outside sources.
On March 4, one of these providers â blockchain intelligence firm Elliptic â published a statement refuting Sandlerâs claims it had been selling usersâ data for financial gain, saying these accusations represent a fundamental misunderstanding of its industry role.
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