- A UK judge has ruled that a litigant can serve legal papers as NFTs
- The targets are only known to the litigant by cryptocurrency addresses, where $2.33 million in cryptocurrency was sent
- This watershed moment is an unexpected first for NFT adoption
A British man can serve anonymous individuals with legal papers through the medium of NFTs, a judge has ruled. In a judgement filed this week, the director of online gambling company Microgame was given permission to use an NFT drop to serve legal papers on two individuals known only to him by their cryptocurrency wallet addresses. The ruling shows the potential of NFTs in various spheres of life, with even the biggest advocate probably not anticipating that one of the sector’s first successes would be as a legal tool.
Company Owner Defrauded by ‘Brokerage Platform’
The case in question is being heard through The High Court of England and Wales, and sees Microgame founder Fabrizio D’Aloia take on what was purported to him to be an online brokerage. D’Aloia deposited about 2.1 million USDT and 230,000 USDC into two wallets he thought were associated with the brokerage but that turned out to be fraudulent.
However, D’Aloia didn’t know the real identities of the individuals involved, with only their cryptocurrency addresses known to him. The court ruling allows D’Aloia to sue the wallet owners through the addresses by dropping an NFT containing the paperwork into those two wallets, with the judge being satisfied that there was a good chance that they would be noticed, given the connection the individual(s) involved had with the two addresses.
NFT Adoption Takes Unexpected Twist
This is something of a watershed moment, especially given the prevalence of cryptocurrency scams, although of course it doesn’t help identify the individuals at the heart of the scams. Of course, if the owners of the wallets try to move the funds there is a good chance they could be traced, especially if they try to cash it out.
If this happens then the NFT serving will become very useful indeed.
