Binance said it froze Tezos (XTZ) tool contributor Baking Bad’s corporate account because of a law enforcement request and said that Baking Bad is aware of the issue behind the freeze as it was notified multiple times.
Binance made the statement in response to allegations that it had frozen and wiped the account “without any explanations.”
In an August 25 tweet, Baking Bad accused the exchange of blocking its corporate trading account and wiping over $1 million without reason.
Our corporate @binance account is blocked since July 1 without any explanations. Today all our balances were set to zero (more than $1M). We have all the materials to begin the investigation and inform the community, but for now just stay away from Binance and @cz_binance #SAFU pic.twitter.com/PpZSBhYpZS
— Baking Bad (@TezosBakingBad) August 25, 2022
Baking Bad allegations
Baking Bad told CryptoSlate that Binance support had informed them of a law enforcement request related to said account on July 4.
However, their attempts to resolve these issues have been futile as there has been no response from the Department of Justice (DoJ).
Baking Bad continued that Binance took “actions with the account without any notification.”
Baking Bad also said they have “no confidence that there really is any investigation.”
According to them, requests made via the DoJ information form should get a response within 20 days. However, the company has yet to get a response even after multiple requests over two months.
Tezos Baking Bad said it passed Binance’s corporate know-your-customer policy on April 25. Yet the exchange did not send any letter to its corporate address — physical or email — before freezing and wiping the account’s funds.
Finally, Binance zeroed our acc without at least court decision in the according jurisdiction (EU entity <-> Binance EU), so no wonder it looks like an illegal thing to us.
— Baking Bad (@TezosBakingBad) August 25, 2022
According to Tezos Baking Bad, what makes everything more suspicious is that Binance zeroed its account without any court decision.
Baking Bad added that the exchange was not safe and urged the community to “stay away from Binance.”
Binance response
A Binance spokesperson told CryptoSlate that Tezos Baking Bad had been informed of the law enforcement request while advising them to use the law enforcement contact form thrice via its support chat system.
The spokesperson said:
“Binance is required to cooperate with such requests, the same as any other exchange.”
As we mentioned, Binance is required to cooperate with such requests, the same as any other exchange.
There is a process to contest the seizure with the agency should you wish to pursue that path. But that is done through the agency, Binance has zero control over that process.
— Binance (@binance) August 25, 2022
A tweet from Binance further alleged that Tezos Baking Bad was misleading the community, adding that the seizure should be contested directly with the agency because it “has zero control over that process.”
Binance is required to cooperate with such requests, the same as any other exchange.
Attempting to mislead the community in regards to your case will not change anything, unfortunately.
— Binance (@binance) August 25, 2022
Community lampoons Binance
Meanwhile, several community members have lampooned the exchange with many others revealing that they suffered a similar fate.
My personal account was blocked due to “suspicious” activity, i had the account since 2018 and in that period was no activity. Kyc done since then. The support was: sorry we cannot say the reason is due to internal policy. is like the system pick random accounts ….
— Ioan Lazar (@_ilazar) August 25, 2022
I can not trust binance amymore.
Transferred my coins to my wallet— Mueller (@Mueller13207992) August 25, 2022
Same!! They locked my account with $100k with no explanations and it have been weeks since! All I can get from support is that ‘they have rights to do so without giving reasons’.. I’m never touching @binance again! @cz_binance
— -,- (@lun4rpunk) August 25, 2022
One user Fabian Burbank wrote that the exchange froze his 2.68 Bitcoin (BTC) for more than a year before wiping his account to zero.
This happened to me as well, my avcount with 2.68BTC (at the moment close to 120.000$) was frozen for more than a year, then 2 months ago my BTC where wiped out of the account while i still didnt have access, all my balances are 0 now. The only explanation was “law enforcement”
— Fabian Burbano (@faburbano) August 26, 2022
According to Burbank, Binance’s only explanation for the situation was “law enforcement.”
Source: https://cryptoslate.com/binance-wipes-tezos-tool-contributor-account-of-1m-following-law-enforcement-request/