U.S. Federal Court Dismisses Terrorism-Related Lawsuit Against Binance and CZ

Odaily News A Manhattan federal judge, Jeannette Vargas, has dismissed a civil lawsuit that sought to hold Binance and its founder CZ accountable, alleging that their trading activities aided terrorist organizations in carrying out global attacks. The judge ruled that the 535 plaintiffs (including victims and their families) failed to reasonably demonstrate that the defendants "intentionally conspired with, participated in, or through their actions ensured the success of the terrorist attacks." The plaintiffs alleged that attacks occurring between 2017 and 2024 were carried out by external terrorist organizations including Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps, ISIS, Kata'ib Hezbollah, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and Al-Qaeda, and attempted to attribute hundreds of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency and transactions with Iranian users to Binance and CZ.

The judge noted that while Binance and CZ might have been aware of the potential for terrorist financing on the exchange, their relationship with the terrorist groups was limited to "them or their affiliates having accounts on Binance and conducting transactions at fair market value." The judge also criticized the plaintiffs' 891-page, 3,189-paragraph complaint as "completely unnecessary," but allowed them to amend it. A Binance spokesperson stated: "The court correctly dismissed these baseless claims. Binance strictly adheres to compliance requirements and has zero tolerance for illicit activities on its platform." CZ also stated that the plaintiffs were attempting to leverage Binance's November 2023 admission of violating anti-money laundering and sanctions laws and its payment of a $4.32 billion penalty to seek treble damages. (Reuters)