Kraken, a prominent cryptocurrency exchange, has announced its compliance with a court order to share user data with the IRS. This court order requires Kraken to provide information about cryptocurrency transactions exceeding $20,000 made by its customers between 2016 and 2020.
Personal details of U.S.-based users, including name, date of birth, tax ID, address, and contact information, will be disclosed to the IRS. Kraken has informed affected customers and sees this development as a victory for privacy advocates following a two-year legal battle.
The exchange successfully defended against the IRS’s intrusive demands, including IP addresses, employment details, sources of wealth, net worth, and banking information.
This case is part of a trend in the crypto industry where government agencies seek user data, highlighting the ongoing conflict between regulatory compliance and user privacy in the cryptocurrency landscape.
This episode is not an isolated incident within the crypto industry. Kraken joins the ranks of other cryptocurrency firms that have faced similar demands from the IRS. Notably, in 2018, a federal judge directed the American crypto exchange Coinbase to provide specific user data to the tax agency.
In 2020, another federal court granted the IRS the legal authority to examine the records of the crypto payments company Circle, seeking data related to transactions of $20,000 or more conducted between 2016 and 2020.
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