Erik Voorhees: Complying With BitLicense Would Have Made ShapeShift Hack Much Worse

The recent hacks at ShapeShift, a sort of vending machine for altcoins, has been one of the biggest stories in Bitcoin for the past few weeks. Although the hacks were a serious hit to the exchange, CEO Erik Voorhees claims things could have been much worse if the startup had decided to comply with BitLicense regulations in New York.
Traditional Regulations Won’t Work
Voorhees was recently on a panel related to disruptive Bitcoin companies at Consensus 2016. OB1 CEO Brian Hoffman, Blockstack Labs co-founder Ryan Shea, and Lightning CEO Elizabeth Starkwere also featured on the panel. The panel was moderated byChamber of Digital Commerce President Perianne Boring.
The topic of regulation came up on multiple occasions during the panel discussion, and Voorhees, a vocal critic of various forms of Bitcoin-related regulations, did not hold back in sharing his contempt for the various legal restrictions that have been placed on Bitcoin (especially the New York BitLicense).

This post was published at Bitcoin Magazine on May 18, 2016.