Roger Ver Defends Coinbase Amid Neutrino Acquisition Controversy

By Prashant Jha

Coinbase has been on the receiving end of a ton of flak over its acquisition of the surveillance firm Neutrino. The community is aghast over the acquisition because the firm has close ties with the notorious Hacking team, a software service offering firm which is known for providing various spyware and surveillance tools to the governments, law enforcement agencies, and dictator regimes.

Amid the cries to boycott Coinbase by different sections of the community, and #deletecoinbase was trending on twitter when the news broke out. However, coinbase has found support in Roger Ver, the owner of bitcoin.com, who has urged his followers to refrain from deleting Coinbase.

Roger Ver believes that Coinbase has done way lot for the crypto community and its acceptance on a larger scale than many others in the game. And, thus despite its pooer business decision, users must give the crypto exchange another chance. Roger tweeted out his support for the coinbase stating,

“Coinbase has done more to drive cryptocurrency adoption than just about any other company. We should be grateful despite a few poor decisions along the way.”

Roger Ver’s support can prove vital in the growth of Coinbase and avoid it meeting a fate similar to Mt. Gox. Roger Ver had earlier supported now deficient Mt. Gox and believed that the exchange can solve its issues and made a video around the topic. However, Mt. Gox collapsed after a month of Ver’s Video.

Coinbase Says Neutrino Acquisition was Purely from a Technical Point of View

Coinbase in its defense has said that the only reason behind the acquisition was to solve its technical clout. In a blog post addressing the issue, the CEO and co-founder Brian Armstrong has mentioned that they have let go of the members who were associated with the notorious Hacking team.

The apology blog seems to have impacted many, and the prominent names of the decentralized space have come up to demand another chance to the exchange, given they have owned to their mistakes and have made amendments to resolve it.

The public backlash was expected given the Hacking team’s work is against the basic principles of decentralization and cryptocurrencies.

Final Thoughts

Coinbase Neutrino acquisition has brought it a ton of flak and rightly so since the use of surveillance companies in the crypto space is already a raging topic of debate. Neutrino in the past has been associated with various governments and law enforcement agencies providing them with malware and surveillance tools. Whether the appeal of Roger Ver makes any difference to the community, only time would tell, however, Coinbase should now focus on