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Tornado Cash is an open-source, non-custodial cryptocurrency mixing protocol on Ethereum, launched in 2019, that obscures the on-chain link between deposit and withdrawal addresses. The U.S. Treasury sanctioned the protocol in August 2022 over its alleged use by the North Korea-linked Lazarus Group and other illicit actors to launder billions of dollars; those sanctions were struck down by the Fifth Circuit in November 2024 and formally lifted by OFAC in March 2025. Separately, co-founder Alexey Pertsev was convicted of money laundering in the Netherlands in 2024 (appeal pending), and co-founder Roman Storm was convicted in August 2025 of one count of conspiring to operate an unlicensed money-transmitting business while a New York jury deadlocked on more serious money-laundering and sanctions-violation charges that remain unresolved pending post-trial motions and a possible retrial.

Token 2049 is one of the world's largest crypto conferences, held annually in Singapore and Dubai by Hong Kong-based BOB Group. The event has faced repeated criticism for insufficient sponsor vetting, most notably when OFAC- and UK-sanctioned Russia-linked stablecoin A7A5 was listed as a platinum sponsor and given a speaking slot at the October 2025 Singapore edition. Separately, in March 2025, on-chain investigator ZachXBT publicly flagged multiple Token 2049 sponsors — including DWF Labs, Bitunix, JuCoin, WEEX, and Spacecoin — for fraud, wash trading, and regulatory non-compliance, warning that conference sponsorship carries no implied credibility.

Circle Internet Group is the issuer of USDC, the second-largest USD-pegged stablecoin by market capitalization. Circle has faced sustained criticism from blockchain investigator ZachXBT and others for its policy of refusing to freeze USDC linked to hacks or scams without a formal court order or law enforcement mandate, which critics allege has allowed over $420 million in illicit funds to flow freely since 2022. The company went public on the NYSE in June 2025 under the ticker CRCL and received conditional OCC approval for a national trust bank charter in December 2025.