Binance is now blocking users 'identified as a US person' with a 14-day deadline 

Quick Take

  • Binance has now brought in stricter measures for blocking U.S. persons from accessing its platform. 
  • The exchange is asking users who have identified themselves as U.S. persons to withdraw funds within 14 days. 

Crypto exchange Binance is moving to impose stricter measures on U.S.-based users and blocking them from accessing its platform. 

Previously, as The Block first reported, Binance was tracking U.S. residents based on their IP addresses and sending them a 90-day notice to withdraw funds.

Now, the exchange is sending a new email to users who have identified themselves as U.S. persons, with a much shorter notice of 14 days to withdraw funds.

The new email, shared with The Block by Binance's customer support team, reads: 

"As we constantly perform periodic sweeps of our existing controls, we noted that you are trying to access Binance while having identified yourself as a US person. Please note that as per our Terms of Use, we are unable to service US persons. Please register for an account over at our partner, Binance US."

The email continues: "You have 14 days to close all active positions on your account and withdraw all your funds, failing which your account will be locked. Once your account is locked, you will have to raise a customer service ticket for us to assist you further."

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Decrypt first reported the existence of the emails with the 14-day withdrawal window.

The recent measures suggest that Binance is beefing up its efforts to block U.S. residents from its platform. Last year, Binance said it would stop serving U.S. residents from September. But until now, the exchange was still effectively allowing U.S. users to access its platform.

As The Block reported recently, a U.S. resident just had to click "I'm not [American]" to set up an account on Binance.com. It remains possible to create an account in this manner.

Following the publication of this story, a spokesperson for Binance told The Block:

"At Binance, we take regulatory compliance seriously and we are always working towards aligning with local, regional and global standards and best practices. As part of our efforts, we constantly perform periodic reviews on all of our users to ensure no one is in breach of our Terms of Use.

We also have procedures in place to offboard any users who we have reasonable cause to believe are U.S. persons or are in violation of our Terms of Use. This is an existing control and is not something that is new. As per our email notifying the user of the detection, any user who receives it has 14 days to completely withdraw all their funds before restrictions and offboarding measures kick in."


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About Author

Yogita Khatri is a senior reporter at The Block, covering all things crypto. As one of the earliest team members, Yogita has played a pivotal role in breaking numerous stories, exclusives and scoops. With nearly 3,000 articles under her belt, Yogita holds the records as The Block's most-published and most-read author of all time. Prior to joining The Block, Yogita worked at crypto publication CoinDesk and The Economic Times, where she wrote on personal finance. To contact her, email: [email protected]. For her latest work, follow her on X @Yogita_Khatri5.