$5M in Tokens Frozen on STEEM, Associated with Hive Supporters

Justin Sun’s handling of the Steem network ever since its acquisition has been subject to much controversy, and rightly so. In recent times, this controversy has only grown, with the Steem network freezing another batch of $5 million in tokens. These tokens were held by dissident stakeholders and witnesses of Steemit.

Totalitarian Enforcements

These network validators, or rather “witnesses,” that are on Sun’s side, have been given the green light to freeze 23.6 million STEEM tokens. The holders of the frozen accounts have been accused of serving as an existential threat to the Steem network at large.

As one would imagine, critics have not taken this lightly, accusing the hard fork network of punishing users who opposed Justin Sun’s takeover of Steem. In retaliation for the Tron founder’s acquisition, a new hard fork emerged in March: The Hive network. This hard fork stands as a community-led blockchain that managed to freeze the founder’s reward that Justin Sun had acquired with Steemit. Thus, the man was excluded from the new network entirely.

Accused of Heinous Crimes

The hard fork, in turn, followed shortly after a soft fork that saw 17.6 million STEEM tokens frozen. These STEEM tokens were held by former witnesses last month.

The code for the next scheduled fork has the names of 64 users within it. These users will have their accounts and funds frozen within the future upgrade.

Through an interview with a Steem Witness going by the name Triple A, Joind tried to get a little more context about the matter. According to Triple A, these accounts have been accused of “spreading fake news,” as well as “writing offensive and pointless spam comments.” Further accusations are the public attacking of users, threatening murder, as well as collecting personal information.

Massive Losses In Capital

However, “phraresim2”, a STEEM user set to be sanctioned, went to twitter and made some impressive claims. According to this user, all the witnesses set to be sanctions were accused of criminal activity, yet proof was never given in turn. This user stated that he held approximately €80,000 in STEEM tokens, having bought 500,000 a year ago.

Another user, going by “They Call Me Dan,” tweeted that the upgrade will leave approximately $600,000 of his funds frozen.

Steem witnesses (voted in by @justinsuntron) are about to take 600k USD worth of Steem away from me. They are going several dozen accounts with a hardfork due for release on the 20th.https://t.co/tIgqF1V4LM@cz_binance @CiaraHuobi @richiela @upbitglobal @BithumbOfficial

— They Call Me Dan (@TheycallmeDan_) May 19, 2020

As the fork pans out, targeted users have started to ask the crypto community at large to begin forwarding letters to exchanges. These letters urged the exchanges not to implement the proposed hard fork that Steem plans to enact. As an incentive, the letter threatens civil liability should they support the fork.