Venezuela blocks Binance, X amid presidential election dispute

Venezuela’s government has blocked access to crypto exchange Binance, social media platform X and other online services amid unrest over disputed presidential election results.

On Aug. 9, local anti-censorship organization VE sin Filtro posted to X that it “detected a DNS block on the cryptocurrency exchange Binance, which affects the normal operation of its website and mobile application.”

“Like several websites of companies from different segments in Venezuela, including social networks, Binance pages have been facing access restrictions,” the exchange’s Latin American-focused X account posted on Aug. 10.

Binance assured that its user’s funds were safe, adding it was “monitoring the situation closely to address it in the best and quickest way possible.”

Binance’s peer-to-peer (P2P) service, where users can directly exchange cash for crypto with one another, is hugely popular in Venezuela as locals seek to buy out of the highly inflated bolívar.

VE sin Filtro recommended Venezuelans use a VPN to skirt the block.

The Aug. 9 Binance block comes a day after Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said in a televised speech that he ordered telco regulator Conatel to ban access to X in the country for ten days, Reuters reported.

Maduro and X owner Elon Musk recently had a public spat. Both have offered — and accepted — challenges to fight each other.

The encrypted messaging app Signal was also blocked the same day, according to internet monitoring project NetBlocks. It added the app “remains functional with the ‘censorship circumvention’ setting enabled.”

Venezuela saw widespread protests after the July 28 presidential election, where Maduro and rival Edmundo González both claimed victory.

The country’s government-controlled electoral authority named Maduro the winner with just over 51% of the vote without releasing a detailed vote count. González has claimed voting machine printouts his party collected prove he’s won with nearly 70% of the vote.

The United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom and multiple South American countries have not recognized Maduro’s claim to the presidency, and many have asked for detailed vote counts.