Coinbase Starts Providing Customer Geolocation Data To ICE

Coinbase starts providing Customer geolocation data to ICE with the agency using the tracker to access customers’ historical tracking data and the transactions on over a dozen cryptocurrencies so let’s read more today in our latest Coinbase news.

The new reports show that the Coinbase exchange provided information to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents with a suite of features that are aimed at tacking the company’s customers. As per the report, ICE was granted access to the app called Coinbase Tracer whcih provides forensic data tracking capabilities. The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement is a government agency under the Department of Homeland Security and the main purpose of ICE is to protect the country from the cross-border crime and illegal immigration.

The Coinbase tracer’s goal is to assist ICE with tracing malicious and fraudulent transactions on the blockchains so according to The Intercept, the tool will help ICE agents to connect addresses to real-world entities. The email released by the Freedom of Information Act showed that ICE was not required to agree to an End User License Agreement with Coinbase but it is used to describe what users can and cannot do with the company’s software products. This means that ICE is free to use the data tools as they wish with minimal restrictions.

When coinbase was asked about the developments, Natasha LaBranche as a spokesperson supplied a link to the company’s website with details about the issue. The link on the Coinbase website stated that the coinbase tracer sources the information from public sources and doesn’t use the actual  Coinbase user data. The spokesperson didn’t provide much info about the limitations on the Tracer’s use by ICE.

As Coinbase starts providing data to ICE, the agency’s access stems from a $1.36 million contract it signed with the crypto exchange back in 2021. at the time, the nature of the contract was quite vague and consisted of the exchange delivering an application development software only as a service. Coinbase was in the news a lot for various reasons recently. First, we saw that it is seeking to expand in the EU while making cuts in its workforce and then we saw Goldman Sachs downgrading the stocks to sell after an 80% correction.