US DOJ says ‘writing code’ is not a crime, signaling shift in crypto enforcement

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The US Department of Justice confirmed that the shipping law is not a crime for encryption developers and open source.
The comments depend on the Blanche Memorandum in April 2025, which announced the end of the “prosecution”.

The US Department of Justice has drawn a new line on how to deal with developers in the digital assets sector, declaring that “just writing a code without a bad intention is not a crime.”

The statement, which he delivered on Thursday by Matthew J. Gallow, the Acting Public Prosecutor for Criminal Division at the Ministry of Justice, is one of the clearest transformations so far in the application of encryption.

Talk to an event Gallowe said that the American innovation project said that the open developers should not be afraid of prosecution just because of the contribution.

He added: “The criminal department will continue to prosecute those who are committing knowledge of knowledge or who help and incite the Crime Committee, including fraud, money laundering and evading penalties.”

Notes come weeks after the New York jury condemnation, Roman Storm, co -founder of Tornado Cash on charges of consumption to operate unlicensed money transfer work.

Prosecutors said that the storm had violated the Federal Basic system 18 USC 1960, but Galicotti made it clear that the new charges under this law will not be approved if the program is truly decentralized, but only leads to automating transactions from peers, and does not give custody or control in the parties of users.

Katie Bieber, chief legal staff at Paradigm, It is called the position of the Ministry of Justice A certain statement that the shipping law is not a crime.

She said: “For a very long time, encrypted developers and open source in the United States lived under a cloud of doubt. This uncertainty ends today.”

The situation also depends on Blanche Dog Memorandum From April 2025, which emphasized that the administration is not an organizer of digital assets and announced the era of “prosecution”.

However, Galeotti warned that developers are not immune if it is possible to prove that the intention to commit crimes or facilitate them. “If there is a criminal intention, there may be other charges,” he said.