The long-standing legal battle of Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev took a pivotal turn on February 7, as he was released from prison custody. He will remain on house arrest while preparing for his legal appeal following nearly 18 months of incarceration. Pretrial Detention Suspended On February 6, a Dutch court ruled to suspend Pertsev’s pretrial detention, initially imposed in August 2022. This decision followed a prior ruling in November 2024 that extended his imprisonment. Despite gaining temporary freedom, Pertsev is required to wear an electronic monitor. “It is not real freedom, but it is better than prison,” Pertsev shared on social media shortly after the ruling. Pertsev’s case has become a flashpoint for privacy advocates, who argue that prosecuting developers of privacy-focused software sets a dangerous precedent. Critics maintain that developers of immutable code, like Tornado Cash, lack control over how users engage with the technology. In May 2024, Pertsev was convicted of money laundering and sentenced to five years and four months in prison. The court found him guilty despite Tornado Cash being an open-source protocol with no centralized control over transactions. Sanctions and Legal Challenges Pertsev’s arrest coincided with the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctions on Tornado Cash in August 2022. Authorities alleged the platform facilitated the laundering of over $7 billion in illicit funds, including $455 million linked to the North Korean hacker group Lazarus. However, the legal landscape has since shifted. In November 2024, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that OFAC had overstepped its authority by sanctioning Tornado Cash’s immutable contracts. Judges asserted that lines of code without ownership did not constitute property and therefore could not be sanctioned. This ruling was further reinforced in January 2025 when the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas overturned the sanctions entirely . Legal experts have hailed the decision as a landmark victory for privacy-preserving technologies, with broad implications for future digital privacy cases in the United States. The post Tornado Cash Developer Alexey Pertsev Released on House Arrest Amid Legal Appeal appeared first on TheCoinrise.com .
