Bankman-Fried might use flip phone under stricter bail plan

Prosecutors and attorneys for FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried are requesting the disgraced cryptocurrency entrepreneur be allowed a flip-phone or one other system that’s not a smartphone whereas on bail.

The proposal, submitted in a letter Friday, comes because the choose within the case is deciding find out how to toughen Bankman-Fried’s bail necessities amid considerations the previous billionaire is perhaps speaking on digital gadgets in methods that may’t be traced.

Prosecutors alleged final month Bankman-Fried used a digital personal community that blocks third events from seeing on-line exercise, often called VPN, to entry the web twice. Additionally they stated he despatched an encrypted message over the Sign texting app in January to the overall counsel of FTX US, a transfer they argued may point out witness tampering.

Bankman-Fried has pleaded not responsible to expenses that he cheated traders and looted buyer deposits at FTX, his cryptocurrency platform.

Choose Lewis A. Kaplan, who’s overseeing the case, has raised the likelihood that Bankman-Fried might need to be jailed if his communications can’t be monitored to make sure the integrity of the trial. The previous FTX head was launched on a $250 million bond in December and is confined to his guardian’s dwelling in Palo Alto, California.

Below the proposal, Bankman-Fried’s telephone features can be restricted to SMS textual content messages and voice calls. He would even be given a brand new laptop computer with restricted use, which will likely be “configured so that he’s solely in a position to go online to the web by the usage of specified VPNs,” that can solely allow entry to web sites which have been whitelisted. They embody websites he can use to arrange for his protection, resembling Ftx.com, and people for private information, like The New York Instances and Netflix.

Within the letter, the 2 sides stated Bankman-Fried would even be allowed entry to a number of functions to arrange for his protection, together with Zoom, Microsoft Workplace and Adobe Acrobat. The events additionally proposed a monitoring software program be put in on the system to trace any exercise, and have Bankman-Fried’s dad and mom submit sworn affidavits that they “won’t deliver extra gadgets into the house” or allow entry to their very own password-protected gadgets.

Kaplan nonetheless has to resolve whether or not to approve to proposal.