The IRS requires Bitcoin exchange Coinbase to provide user information, and the two parties may go to court

On November 20th , local time in the United States , the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) issued a statement to Coinbase , the most popular Bitcoin trading platform in the United States , requiring Coinbase to provide all customer information from 2013 to 2015 .

The Northern California District Court is collecting information about "John Does". "John Does" refers to some unidentified people or groups in the United States. All American citizens who have traded convertible virtual currencies between January 2013 and December 31 , 2015 are under investigation. Therefore, the IRS needs Coinbase to provide customer information to find this John Does .

According to the investigation documents officially released by the IRS, the IRS believes that it has " sufficient reasons " to conduct this investigation because a considerable number of Coinbase users do not comply with US domestic tax laws and are suspected of tax evasion.

The IRS believes that these potential "John Does " not only fail to comply with U.S. tax laws, but may even be involved in violations.

The IRS requires Coinbase to provide users' accounts, Bitcoin wallets and registration information, including all users' profile information, transaction records, income balances, destination addresses and identity authorization information.

The U.S. Treasury Department's inspector general recently issued a statement urging the IRS to " take additional steps to ensure taxpayers are complying with tax laws. "

Coinbase may be taking the IRS to court. The digital asset trading platform has cooperated with law enforcement agencies several times before, but this request from the IRS is undoubtedly unprecedented. Coinbase said in a blog post:

Although Coinbase is generally willing to cooperate with relevant law enforcement agencies, we are also concerned that the government's indiscriminate investigation will reveal more information. It is very important to us to protect the privacy of our customers' information, and our legal team is also processing the request from the IRS . At this point, we will present the government's ( IRS ) complaint in court. We will keep our users updated on the latest developments in this matter.