Korean Crypto Expert Spat with Chief Regulator at a Public Forum

A South Korean blockchain expert has condemned the government’s handling of the industry’s regulation.

Speaking to the head of South Korean regulator the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) Lee Geun-charm, Park Sung-joon, head of the Blockchain Research Center at Dongguk University, said initiating different ways of dealing with cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies was useless.

Sung-joon argues that one cannot exist without the other. He said, “In the digital asset trading market, virtual currency and the blockchain cannot be separated because they need the appropriate means of payment.”

In his response, Lee Geun-charm said, “I sympathize with the words of Park Chan-hee, and I will pass on his suggestions to the financial authorities.”

The high level advocacy of a more level landscape for the two aspects of cryptographic technology denotes a higher step in the growing backlash against blockchain hype.

Inside the cryptocurrency industry, in April, instructor and speaker Andreas Antonopoulos had cautioned against the idea of a blockchain without the advantages of decentralized cryptocurrency networks, calling it “a very slow database.”

Across the border, Chinese authorities are also intending to release feedbacks for blockchain projects, having effectively done as such for 26 cryptocurrencies prior this month.

In the meantime, government specialists have recommended blockchain projects are extensively unsuccessful, enduring an average of only 15 months.

Korea’s regulatory push, which started decisively in Q3 2017, has so far seen taxation requirements put on cryptocurrency trades, alongside a restriction on unknown exchanging and ICOs, which lawmakers presently formally propose to lift.