In D’Aloia v Persons Unknown, Binance Holdings Limited & Others, the fraudsters induced the victim to transfer USDT and USDC tokens to the wallet of persons unknown for alleged investment purposes. The investment was subsequently found to be a scam and the victim was unable to realise any of his investments. Some of these tokens were further transferred to various private wallet addresses.
In an application for injunctive relief against the fraudsters and cryptocurrency exchanges controlling the wallets where tokens were dissipated to, the UK court for the first time allowed substituted service on the fraudsters via non-fungible token (NFT) by airdropping documents on a blockchain wallet in addition to service by email. The court is convinced that it is likely to lead to a greater prospect of the fraudsters being put on notice of the court order and the commencement of the proceedings. This alternative mode of service was later confirmed and adopted in Jones v Persons Unknown.
In the US, a California district court recently granted an order in Commodity Futures Trading Commission v Ooki DAO to permit alternative service on a ‘decentralised autonomous organisation’ (DAO). The court backed service methods including communications via the DAO’s help chat box and by posting on the DAO’s online forum. It remains to be seen if this decision will be successfully challenged.
In Hong Kong SAR, substituted service is governed by Order 65 rule 4 and 5 of the Rules of the High Court (cap 4A). Hong Kong courts have on a number of occasions permitted service to be effected by the use of email, Facebook, WhatsApp and even data room.
In confirms alternative routes serve court proceedings technology evolves
