As much as cryptocurrencies have been applauded, their rapidly growing adoption has also raised concern from authoritative bodies. As a result, cryptography is losing one of its largest USPs of being decentralized and private.
The Indian government interferes
As per a new directive issued by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) will be responsible for managing all aspects relating to cybersecurity, inducing the following details:
- Collection, analysis and dissemination of information on cyber incidents.
- Cybersecurity incident predictions and alerts.
- Emergency measures for the management of cybersecurity incidents.
- Coordination of cyber incident response activities.
- Issue guidelines, warnings, vulnerability notes, and whitepapers relating to information security practices, procedures, prevention, response and reporting of cyber incidents.
- Such other functions related to information security may be prescribed.
But beyond those responsibilities, the ministry has also focused specifically on the business related to cryptography. This is because crypto crime has grown immensely over the years.
Just this year, the crypto space witnessed the biggest hack ever. This is when Axie Infinity's Ronin bridge was exploited for $ 625 million.
However, in doing so, the IT ministry has asked all virtual asset service providers, exchanges and custodian wallet providers to keep all user information, as well as financial transaction records for a period of five years. .
Explaining the reason further, the new directive reads:
"[...] in order to guarantee cyber security in the payment sector and financial markets for citizens, protecting their data, fundamental rights and economic freedom in view of the growth of virtual assets."
The country's stance on crypto continues to tilt in an unfavorable direction since the government proposed the 30% crypto tax. The tax has already been criticized by citizens as it aims to keep people away from using crypto.
But India isn't the only country interfering in crypto operations.
America and Japan were the first to do this
After Russia invaded Ukraine, countries around the world began to impose sanctions on the Russian government and oligarchs. But to make sure they are financially locked, with no escape, many countries have begun to suspend their access to cryptocurrencies.
The US started the trend after the White House asked most major cryptocurrency exchanges to block sanctioned Russian accounts. While there was a bit of back and forth in the beginning, exchanges and trading platforms like Bitcoin Revolution, Binance, Coinbase and FTX have given in and ended up blocking accounts.
Japan took a step forward, and the country's Financial Services Agency warned its cryptocurrency exchanges that the government would impose sanctions if cryptocurrency exchanges failed to comply with the sanction rules. So, while on the one hand cryptography makes progress, it is forced to take a step backwards with such incidents.
