from Hacker News

Art is crime [NFT artist funds seized]

by fred256 on 7/18/22, 3:01 PM with 62 comments

• by iskander on 7/18/22, 4:32 PM

  Whatever your opinions on generative art sold as NFTs, the lack of regulatory clarity seems pretty stifling.

  The author asked for guidance:

  >I called the VID (Latvian State Revenue Service) and asked in detail what I should do. I was told that I should first register as a self-employed person with the profession of an artist. And I have to convert my income into fiat and pay tax on the income in fiat because cryptocurrency is not money in Latvia.

  ...followed it by converting to Euros and paying taxes and then still had his bank account frozen for half a year without any further clarification on what he did wrong or how to fix it.

• by yellow_lead on 7/18/22, 3:50 PM

  Whether or not you suspect he is guilty, according to the timeline, the police seized his property without justification delivered to him or his lawyer, which appears to be required by law. If you are ok with that for a suspected guilty person, I hope you aren't ever wrongly accused.

• by ImPostingOnHN on 7/18/22, 3:50 PM

  I get that this blog is one sided because it's literally from one of the sides, but not providing any details of the allegations seems sketchy, and makes me wonder what other important details he is omitting. Are we to assume that because this guy has a blog, he must not be guilty?

• by pjc50 on 7/18/22, 3:54 PM

  Reminds me of all the US cops just seizing cash and forcing a lawsuit for it to be returned.

  However, it's an inherent risk with crypto if the law requires all your income to be explicable. i.e.

  >> The decision to arrest stated that I was receiving money from Coinbase, and therefore it is impossible to trace the source of funds

  It's not clear if he knew who his counterparties were? (natural persons, not accounts)

  I see the comment thread is going to be people just assuming guilt or innocence based on a cursory reading of this, which is going to be a mess.

• by rocketeeter on 7/18/22, 4:27 PM

  Devastating to see a government come after an artist with no justification. Shvembldr has been such a positive force for good in the generative art space. Stay strong

• by rez8 on 7/18/22, 4:38 PM

  "I do not like NFTs, therefor this guy is a scammer, and deserves to have his assets seized" - HackerNews community

  Disappointing.

• by gizmo on 7/18/22, 3:54 PM

  I haven't read the entirety of the page, but I think I got the main points. The artist claims he's in the clear because he paid taxes on his income he made by selling NFT artpieces created by him.

  However, he gives no indication (as far as I can tell) that he has any kind of information on his customers. Does he have invoices? Did he collect name, address, and phone number for each customer? Did he make a reasonable effort to see if his customers were not obvious crooks? He published transactions from various crypto chains, but that doesn't prove anything except that crypto transactions have taken place.

  The author rants extensively about how corrupt and illegal the government's actions are, but he provides no evidence that he conducted his business in a serious and professional way. He feels like his actions should be legal, but it's not obvious that he hasn't inadvertently facilitated money laundering. After all, if he's a popular NFT artists then people with illicitly gained crypto could easily have been trading his NFT art to launder their money.

  I think it's pretty likely that much of last year's NFT bubble was the result of scammers/fraudsters/ponzi operators looking to obscure the source of their new wealth, and this guy happened to be a big beneficiary of it.

• by elil17 on 7/18/22, 4:00 PM

  In countries where free expression is actually a crime, people don’t just get their money seized, they get arrested. There’s probably a due process issue here but that doesn’t mean “art is a crime.” If anyone speaks Latvian I would love to know what those legal documents he posted say the crime he committed was.

• by witheld on 7/18/22, 3:34 PM

  I don’t believe him. It sounds to me like he played the usual scheme, having people pay for his NFTs to inflate their value- while sending the funds back.

• by malfist on 7/18/22, 3:34 PM

  Well that's a sensationalist title and hyperbole filled article.

  Art is not illegal. Money laundering is.