Wallet Of Satoshi (WoS) Goes Missing In The US, Is Apple Involved?

As it approaches over a million transactions for November, the Bitcoin (BTC) Lightning payments app Wallet of Satoshi (WoS) has vanished from both Google's Play Store and Apple's App Store in the United States.

On November 24, a number of users and members of the cryptocurrency community posted on X (Twitter) about their unsuccessful attempts to find the WoS app, which either returned no results or sent users to rival wallet apps.

At the time of writing, the WoS app was still available for download on the Australian and Singaporean Google Play Stores, as well as the Australian Apple App Store. Industry author and podcaster Kevin Rooke claims that Wallet of Satoshi, a well-known Lightning payments network, was expected to conduct more than 1.1 million Lightning payments in November. It would be the company's "largest month of Lightning payments ever," according to Rooke.

But in an X (formerly Twitter) post, Wallet of Satoshi clarified things by saying that it was not removed from the app stores. It stated, "We've made the difficult decision to remove our app from the Apple and Google app stores in the United States, and going forward, we will not serve U.S. customers."

„This decision doesn't come lightly. Our commitment to providing a secure, user-friendly, and compliant platform globally is unwavering. Our top priority is the safety and interests of our customers and our company. We understand this may be disappointing news and we share your frustration. We're hopeful that future developments will allow us to revisit and possibly resume our operations in the U.S.“ the company wrote.

The post made reference to a potential resume based on “future developments,” but it did not provide an explanation for the sudden termination of services in the U.S. Current American users of Bitcoin are still able to move their tokens to different wallets and maintain complete access to their funds.

In-app purchases are subject to a steep 30% tax levied by Apple, which it strictly regulates and has made it difficult for cryptocurrency platforms to get listed in the App Store.

A class-action complaint was launched against Apple on November 17 by a group of irate users of the Block Cash App and PayPal Venmo. The lawsuit claims that Apple entered into anti-competitive agreements with PayPal and Block in order to limit the use of cryptocurrency technology and payments on iOS.