- It was an experiment to test the verification system from one of the members of the community
- He also used several other names on the OFAC sanctions list.
A Twitter user with the nickname “ZachXBT” published yesterday, May 9, the results of his experiment with the Gate.io platform. He registered on the site under the name “Kim Jong-un”, indicated “notlazarus” as an email, and still successfully passed KYC.
“When stolen funds are laundered through an exchange, people like to think that some real person is behind it. To disprove this, I was able to create a “Kim Jong-un” account on Gate.io with the mail “notlazarus” and received confirmation in a few minutes, – noted in his post user.
Then the author created several more accounts. In particular, he used the pseudonym “Jack Hoff”, which is also on the sanctions list. He also created several mailboxes labeled “harmonyhacker” and “lazaruslover”.
As the ID number, the user entered an arbitrary combination. The data has not been verified. Several users unsubscribed in the “thread”, joking on this topic:
The press service of Gate.io, of course, did not comment on the situation. But the fact remains, the ZachXBT experiment showed how easy it really is to cheat the KYC verification mechanism.
We also recall that it is often the problems in this system that are the cause of numerous CEX fines from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
And sometimes the exchanges themselves make “loopholes” in this mechanism. For example, we previously reported on CNBC’s investigation that Binance is helping Chinese clients bypass verification.
It is ironic that this week the OKX exchange tightened KYC requirements without explanation. I wonder if the site has the same “leaky” mechanism or is it just Gate.io’s puncture?
