Coinbase’s Base will likely feature transaction monitoring, AML measures

Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said: March 6 His company’s Layer 2 network, Base, likely has transaction monitoring and anti-money laundering measures, he said.

Base features compliance measures

In an interview with Bloomberg, Armstrong said:

“Currently, Base has some centralized components, but as it grows, it will become more and more decentralized over time. …Things like that need to be considered early on.”

Armstrong suggested that centralized actors would likely be responsible for avoiding money laundering and maintaining transaction monitoring programs in the long term. It is unclear whether it was intended to apply to centralized actors, or to centralized actors in general.

While Base will be open to all developers, Coinbase’s initial announcement suggested that Base would be “the home of Coinbase’s on-chain products.” Presumably, existing products that Coinbase integrates with Base will maintain his original KYC/AML measures.

That earlier announcement also suggested Base would be “progressively decentralized,” but did not suggest a lack of regulatory compliance in doing so.

What is Coinbase Base?

Coinbase first announced Base on February 23rd. At the time, the company said it planned to work with Ethereum’s existing Layer 2 project, Optimism, to build the platform. Coinbase as a core developer he joins Optimism and uses the OP stack.

The company also noted at the time that Base will work with Ethereum itself, other Layer 2 networks, and compatible Layer 1 blockchains such as Solana.

The base is now on testnet and available to developers, but not yet applicable to real use cases. Coinbase has not announced a mainnet launch date.

Armstrong said today that Base aims to improve the scalability and usability of Ethereum and related networks, while keeping transaction fees below 1 cent.

Contrary to previous speculation, the base does not have its own token.