Arkham Intelligence, a blockchain sleuthing company in the vein of Chainalysis and others, recently announced the release of a platform to de-anonymize and exchange blockchain user information, as well as the release of a new ARKM token to go with it.
Snitch as a Service
Billed as "the world's first on-chain intelligence exchange", Arkham Intelligence will allow users of the service to post bounties for any information about blockchain users.
"Our vision for the Intel Exchange is a decentralized intel-to-earn economy powered by smart contracts, in which any detective can earn based on their skill and experience. Thus, all transactions on the Arkham Market will be done through smart contracts audited by our partner Quantstamp.
There are no limitations on the type of information that can be requested, although the company has promised to ban spammers and those who submit low-quality information.
Once the requested information is discovered, the person who posted the bounty will have a 90-day exclusivity period to use the newly gleaned information as they see fit. After this period, the information will become part of Arkham's public database.
Naturally, the announcement of a tool that could remove one of the main things that attracts some users to blockchain technology has left the crypto community divided, with some to accuse Arkham to try to become the arbiter of good and evil.
More cynical users also chimed in, reminding others that this platform could very easily be used to uncover the identities of whales, which could be targeted online or in real life - much like what happened after Ledger Wallet leaked.
Meanwhile, Arkham seems to have gotten a head start in the blockchain de-anonymization game — starting with its own fans.
Doxxing its own user base
Shortly after announcing the launch of its new service, Arkham was criticized for doxing its own users through the platform's waitlist referral links.
The referral, which was supposed to contain a random string of numbers, actually encodes the user's email address using BASE64 – an encryption algorithm that is trivially easy to decode.
Some users have even accused Arkham of doing this on purpose, as it's unlikely a detective-centric company would accidentally make such a huge mistake.