Coinbase, which is counted among the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, has been hit by legal matters in recent days. In a new development, the company has been sued for ‘improperly and unreasonably’ locking users from their accounts, especially in these recent days of market volatility. In his lawsuit, plaintiff George Kattula also alleges that the San Francisco-based company does not maintain standard practices for securing user accounts. After suffering the consequences of not having access to his account through Coinbase, Kattula decided to take legal action against Coinbase.
“This is a class action brought by plaintiffs on behalf of all Coinbase wallets and account holders whose accounts have been breached and damages resulting from unauthorized transfer of assets – including unauthorized transfer of ‘crypto’ securities listed on Coinbase’s platform including registration details, being registered as a broker or dealer without Coinbase, and being registered as a securities exchange without Coinbase,” the lawsuit filed With the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, the Atlanta Division said.
The complaint calls into question Coinbase’s promise to provide the real-time and global nature of the crypto asset markets.
According to Kattula, he was out of an account for a long time, which prevented him from participating in the business, which cost him money.
For now, Coinbase has not addressed the matter in the public domain.
The crypto exchange is under scrutiny from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) investigating whether Coinbase has listed nine securities as tokens.
The price of Coinbase shares also fell as much as 21 percent after the SEC launched its investigation on the exchange.
In June, the company also laid off 18 percent of its workforce, calling it a cost-cutting measure in these ongoing times of industrial decline.
In May, after Coinbase reported a 44 percent drop, the crypto exchange only managed to rope in $1.17 billion (about Rs 9,037 crore) in revenue in the first three months of this year.
