Anyone moving more than $20,000 on the platform is subject to the new order
Today, Coinbase suffered a major defeat at the hands of the Internal Revenue Service, nearly a year after the case was initially filed. A California federal court has ordered Coinbase to turn over identifying records for all users who have bought, sold, sent, or received more than $20,000 through their accounts in a single year. Coinbase estimates that 14,355 users meet the government?s requirements. The full order is embedded below.
For each account, the company has been asked to provide the IRS with the user?s name, birth date, address, and taxpayer ID, along with records of all account activity and any associated account statements. The result is both a definitive link to the user?s identity and a comprehensive record of everything they?ve done with their Coinbase account, including other accounts to which they?ve sent money.
?A BAD PRECEDENT FOR FINANCIAL PRIVACY?
The order is significantly narrower than the IRS?s initial request, which asked for records on every single Coinbase user over the same period. That request would also have required all communications between Coinbase and the user, a measure the judge ultimately found unnecessarily comprehensive.