MSTR Cat

Crypto Law/Level IX · Death, divorce and disputes/9.3 Going to court/Lesson 6

Serving papers by NFT

Why courts in New York, England and Florida have let claimants deliver lawsuits by airdropping a token into a wallet, the rules that allow it, and the international treaty that limits it.

Education, not legal, tax or investment advice. Crypto law differs between countries and states and changes often. Check the current rules where you live with a qualified lawyer or tax adviser before you act.

The lean path

The cheapest, lowest-tax, simplest and most private route the law allows, best first. Each step names the rule it rests on and the condition that keeps it lawful.

  1. For a known defendant in the US, ask them to waive service first: under Rule 4(d), a defendant who refuses without good cause must pay later service costs; allow at least 30 days, or 60 abroad.
  2. For unknown defendants, request alternative service in the same application as the freezing order: Federal Rule 4(f)(3) or English CPR 6.15 lets a court approve token service; both require a court order first.
  3. Pair the service token with email and a website posting, as the courts did in LCX, D’Aloia and Bowen v. Li; none of these courts approved token-only service, which invites challenge.
  4. The Hague Service Convention does not apply where the defendant’s address is unknown (Article 1), avoiding costly central-authority service; where an address is known, Smart Study (2d Cir. 2025) barred email service into China.
  5. Keep dated evidence of the wallet’s activity and its link to the loss, plus every other contact channel; under Mullane, notice must be reasonably calculated to reach the defendant.

MaterialsLCX AG v. John Doe Nos. 1-25, Index No. 154644/2022 (N.Y. Sup. Ct.), order of 2 June 2022Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 4(f)(3) and Civil Procedure Rule 6.15 (England and Wales)Article 1 of the Hague Service Convention (1965)A block-explorer view of the wallet address involved in your dispute

Wonder

  1. Does sending a token to a wallet really tell someone they are being sued?
  2. What if the wallet’s owner never looks at it?
  3. Can papers be served this way on someone in another country?

Explore

  1. Service of process is the formal delivery of court papers that tells a defendant a case has begun; without valid service a court generally cannot enter a binding judgment. Normally it means handing papers to a named person at a known address, and crypto thieves offer neither, only a wallet address. The US constitutional standard leaves room to adapt. In Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., decided on 24 April 1950, the Supreme Court required notice ‘reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to apprise interested parties of the pendency of the action’. Many court systems also let judges authorise alternative methods when the usual ones fail.
  2. The case its lawyers described as a first came after hackers took about $7.9 million from LCX, a Liechtenstein exchange, in January 2022; by June about 1.3 million USDC sat at one Ethereum address. On 2 June 2022 Justice Andrea Masley of the New York Supreme Court issued a temporary restraining order and directed service ‘via a special-purpose Ethereum-based token (the Service Token) delivered-airdropped into the Address’. The token carried a hyperlink to a website holding the papers, with a way to track clicks. Lawyers for the ‘Doe’ defendants later appeared in the case and argued that the service was improper.
  3. England followed within weeks. In D’Aloia v Persons Unknown, on 24 June 2022, Mr Justice Trower allowed service by an NFT airdropped into wallets linked to a fake brokerage website, in addition to service by email. Rule 6.15 of the Civil Procedure Rules lets a court permit service by an alternative method where ‘there is a good reason’. The judge found good reason in the difficulty of serving an unidentified defendant, and said service by NFT was ‘likely to lead to a greater prospect’ of those behind the website being put on notice. He was not asked to, and did not, authorise service by NFT alone.
  4. US federal courts can authorise service on a defendant abroad under Rule 4(f)(3), ‘by other means not prohibited by international agreement, as the court orders’. On 3 March 2023, in Bowen v. Li, Judge Beth Bloom of the Southern District of Florida allowed a plaintiff who alleged the theft of about $2.2 million in crypto to serve foreign defendants by sending a ‘Service NFT’ to their wallets and posting the papers on a website. She reasoned that the Hague Service Convention does not specifically preclude service by NFT, that China had not objected to that method, and that it was reasonably calculated to reach defendants who ran their scheme online.
  5. That treaty is the main limit. The Hague Service Convention of 1965 applies whenever documents are sent abroad for service, but Article 1 says it ‘shall not apply where the address of the person to be served with the document is not known’. Where an address is known, courts disagree about electronic methods. On 18 December 2025, in Smart Study Co. v. Shenzhenshixindajixieyouxiangongsi, the Second Circuit held that the Convention barred email service on defendants in China, which has objected to service through postal channels. Its view that the Convention’s methods form a closed list differs from the reasoning in Bowen, so the answer can depend on the court.
  6. Token service has so far worked as a supplement, not a shortcut. In the New York case the court accepted it because the token went to the very address holding the stolen assets, valuable holdings made it likely the defendants would return to it, and the token linked to the full papers. In each case above, a website or email accompanied the token. A practical check: if a claim turns on a wallet, keep dated evidence of the address’s activity and of its link to your loss, and record every other channel, such as an email or social account, through which the same person has contacted you.

Key facts

  • Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co. (1950) requires notice reasonably calculated, under all the circumstances, to inform parties of a pending action.
  • On 2 June 2022 a New York Supreme Court order in LCX AG v. John Doe Nos. 1-25 directed service by a token airdropped into the defendants’ Ethereum address.
  • In D’Aloia v Persons Unknown (2022) the English High Court permitted service by NFT in addition to email under CPR rule 6.15.
  • In Bowen v. Li (S.D. Fla. 3 March 2023) a federal court permitted service on foreign defendants by NFT and website posting under Rule 4(f)(3).
  • Article 1 of the Hague Service Convention states that it does not apply where the address of the person to be served is not known.
  • In Smart Study Co. v. Shenzhenshixindajixieyouxiangongsi (2d Cir. 2025) the court held that the Hague Service Convention barred email service on defendants in China.

Exercise nine, six, three, one

9CollectList up to 9 ways the other party in a crypto dispute you know of could be contacted or identified, such as wallet addresses, emails, social accounts, websites or exchange accounts (some lists are shorter).
6ClusterSort them into 6 groups: wallet addresses, email addresses, social or messaging accounts, websites, exchange accounts, and physical addresses.
3DistillReduce the 6 groups to 3: channels a court might accept for service, channels useful only as evidence of identity, and channels the person probably no longer uses.
1CrystallizeWrite 1 sentence explaining why courts pair a service token with a website or email rather than relying on the token alone.

Fact check

Dates, figures and claims checked against the published sources listed below.

Open in the interactive academy →

PT ES ZH JA KO RU DE FR MS