Developers, along with crypto and privacy advocates, rallied in support of arrested Tornado Cash developer Alexey Pertsev. A group of over 50 people gathered in Dam Square, Amsterdam. Pertsev’s wife helped organize the protest event and is also taking part in it.
Those protesting argue that Pertsev should not be held accountable for writing open-source code, regardless of how it’s used by bad actors. On August 12, Pertsev was arrested by Dutch authorities in Amsterdam two days after the US government sanctioned Tornado Cash.
Last week, FIOD disclosed more information about the arrest and accusation against him.
FIOD said that the developer is accused of concealing criminal financial flows and facilitating money laundering through Tornado Cash. The event Page of the protest states that the accusation against Alex threatens to kill the entire open-source software segment.
The supporters also believe that no one will dare to write and publish open-source code or invest in segments if they could be made responsible for the use of the tool they created by other parties.
Petr Korolev, the Oxorio co-founder, said on Twitter that Pertsev has not been officially charged but rather interrogated about his role in developing the protocol. Korolev also expressed his concern saying, “On the other hand, Alex is my friend. I am worried about him, his wife has been unable to visit him for two weeks, and we don’t understand what is going on.”
He added that this is a major case and if Alex is found guilty then it will create a precedent that could hit open-source developers.
A Telegram group solely set up to coordinate the protest includes Aave founder Stani Kulechov and Yearn Finance core developer Banteg. Conversations in the group suggest there might be a second protest in London in the coming weeks.
More than 1950 people have signed a petition protesting Pertsev’s arrest and urging developers to maintain the right to write open-source code.
