What is the point of this KYC anyway? To 'know your customer' right? As in the (financial) institution who provides services to you, must know you and thus be sure they are not somehow aiding a known criminal in committing more crimes. Because the authorities only care about money being used to fund criminal activity or to launder it, they mostly focus on banks and now also crypto. But this recent MS app store debacle where a fake Legder app stole almost one million Dollars in a matter of weeks proves yet again how backwards all this really is.
Ledger itself foolishly enough (some say it was more rather than foolishly) also started to explore the world of this KYC, but just look at what I mean with ''backwards'': ''Microsoft has recently removed from its store a fraudulent LEDGER Live app for cryptocurrency management after multiple users lost at least $768,000 worth of cryptocurrency assets...Published with the name Ledger Live Web3, the fake application appears to have been present in the Microsoft Store since October 19 but the cryptocurrency theft started being reported just a couple of days ago.''
This is by no means a new phenomenon, I remember this example of a fake EOS app in the Apple app store that stole millions in EOS coins years ago. Fake apps stealing millions worth of crypto have been around for years and very little is done to protect users from it. The app store's logic is ''hey, you agreed to our terms, so no trying to sue us for your losses, those are all gone.'' So....OK, that protects you from being liable, but what about the consumer who KYCd both at their bank and the crypto exchange in order to get that crypto and is now left empty handed? Where's his protection in all this? Isn't it time for the authorities to actually be useful for once and do something about this?
They don't and this is the part that really irritates me: "BleepingComputer reached out to Microsoft for a comment about the screening process for submitted apps and a spokesperson said that the company is “continually working to ensure malicious content is identified and taken down quickly.” In the very same article this example is given of some poor user who lost everything he had in literally minutes:
''Downloaded a new Ledger app I found on Microsoft Store after reinstalling windows on my computer for about 1-2 hours ago. Had not accessed it through ledger live in a while and was prompted to input my 24 word seed recover phrase. Didn't think more about that since so much had happened with both reinstalling Microsoft OS and Ledger Live App, but... It took a few minutes before I saw all my crypto, $18,5k bitcoin and about $8k alt coins disappear.''
So unless these app stores can ''work to ensure malicious content is identified''in a matter of MINUTES, they are not doing enough to prevent this, period. I'm not the most experienced when it comes to phones or app stores but am I being naive? Am I missing something when I ask that maybe, just maybe when it comes to apps linked to financial institutions i.e. banking and crypto apps, there should be a KYC and the authorities' focus should be on.....you know, the app stores and who they allow to place those high risk apps associated with financial institutions on their platform?
Just a spontaneously insane idea. I mean I know we don't like the idea of KYC in crypto but the one place where authorities should 100% be focused on, is were they drop the ball completely and allow the app stores to 100% exempt themselves from any responsibly and consequences whilst simultaneously almost inviting criminals to come in take advantage of their platform.
