Acryptoinvest.news: Tether, the company behind the world's largest stablecoin, has frozen the wallets of individuals sanctioned by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the company announced today.
In its statement, Tether described the move as a voluntary move to “proactively prevent any potential misuse of Tether tokens and strengthen security measures” and explained that existing wallets on the OFAC list will be frozen along with any new wallets added in the future.
The move appears to be one of the first significant steps taken by CEO Paolo Ardoino, the company's former CTO who took the reins this month. In a company press release, Ardoino praised the new policy as “an expansion of our close working relationships with law enforcement agencies and regulators around the world.”
While Tether has frozen funds associated with illegal activity several times in the past, the company was reluctant to freeze wallets that interacted with the sanctioned Tornado Cash protocol, claiming that it had not received any requests from US law enforcement to do so.. Following today's announcement, blockchain records show that Tether has blacklisted Tornado Cash contract addresses.