Vitalik strongly supports Tornado Cash developers and condemns treating code as a criminal act.

PANews reported on January 9th that, according to The Block, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin released a letter of support on Friday, strongly endorsing Tornado Cash developer Roman Storm. Storm is currently awaiting sentencing in the United States after being convicted of conspiracy to transfer funds in August. Buterin believes the prosecution targets the software development process itself, not the direct financial harm it caused. He sees privacy tools like Tornado Cash as a necessary defense against systemic data exploitation, and revealed that he has used software developed by Storm to purchase technical tools and support human rights charities, and that the data was not recorded by businesses or governments.

Buterin stated that he has always supported Storm's work, both because he firmly believes in the importance of privacy and because he is an active user of privacy tools. Unlike some who profit in the name of privacy and develop flashy but impractical software, Storm's applications can still function normally even after years of neglect, making him more respectable than many "consumer tech" companies. Furthermore, Buterin places the Storm case within the broader debate on data protection, pointing out that privacy protection should be a fundamental infrastructure, not a niche issue, and that modern privacy tools aim to perpetuate protective measures implemented before the widespread adoption of digital surveillance.