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Bitcoin Trading Platform Cryptsy Locks User’s 175+ Bitcoins

Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:42 PM
P. H. Madore
Last Updated March 4, 2021 4:42 PM

Recently a Bitcoiner who goes on Reddit by the name alkinsonf began posting  a series of complaints against the popular exchange Cryptsy. The user declared that after a brief time of uninterrupted trading, his account was locked with over 175 Bitcoin in it. The user sent several requests for support, as you can imagine, and was not immediately helped. Finally, it was revealed that he would need to verify his identity.

Living in Ukraine, the user has had some degree of difficulty doing this since things are in disarray with the civil war that’s going on there. For its part, Cryptsy had no comment on the issue, saying that it does not comment on active matters like this one. A number of questions arise from this action, however.

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Within Its Rights?

First off, is Cryptsy within its rights to simply freeze the funds of a member and demand that he verifies his identity? As has been stated, the verification of the user’s identity is proving difficult, after all, because of the situation his government is in. What if he were never able to verify? What would become of this substantial amount of funds then?

According to Cryptsy’s terms of service, they are well within their rights. To be specific:

We have the right, unilaterally and with immediate effect, to suspend or withdraw permanently your ability to use any Electronic Service, or any part thereof, without notice, where we consider it necessary or advisable to do so, for example due to your non-compliance with the Applicable Regulations, breach of any provisions of this Agreement, on the occurrence of an Event of Default, network problems, failure of power supply, for maintenance, or to protect you when there has been a breach of security.

It does seem that the intent of these terms is for the return of the money. It does not say what happens if the user is unable to verify their identity in order to retrieve their funds. It would seem there would have to be some option of having the money sent to the same address it was sent from, or something along those lines that would satisfy a user in such a situation.

As you know, this isn’t the first time Cryptsy’s policies and technical difficulties have brought about the ire of members of the community. It seems when it comes to an exchange or anything that a large number of people have an interest in, there will always be talk of insolvency and incompetence. Of course, matters like these can be solved with a great deal less drama when the support team is more motivated in the direction of resolving such problems quickly. When you’re holding a large number of people’s money in your hands, it’s important to maintain an image of trust and reliability.

As to the affected user in question, he’s being overtly patient. “I create a new ticket, but so far no response. Hopefully tomorrow will be the answer,” he told CCN.com.