Kraken

I have signed up for Kraken personal and business wallets and both have received and sent small funds without issue yet. The business account signup process had some concerns where they appeared to have a worryingly low comprehension of Australian regulatory processes. They also asked for additional information multiple times which wasn't asked for to begin with and appeared to be phishing.

I started researching the company and found a blogger who reported Kraken's very detailed customer data is for sale on the dark web.

More recently I have been advised by Australia's cybercrime division that all my data and accounts have been accessed and used by cyber criminals.

I can't say Kraken is 100% responsible but not securing personal data is cause enough for concern.

Kraken are also publicly advertising on their website that you can use their platform to buy Handshake HNS in Australia, however at the same time they also advise by their (aiwful) chatbot that they do not offer Handshake HNS in Australia. Kraken is definitely false advertising in Australia and seems negligent to the fact this is a crime.

Update: some weeks later Kraken finally replied to my complaint about falsely supporting Handshake HNS coins, used for the Handshake root DNS zoning system that is an alternative-redundancy option to ICANN. They apologised for the false advertising and said they will fix the issue with their marketing team. That is a better outcome than nothing but still a very concerning lack of integrity that they falsely advertised at all in the first place.

On 15/04/2025 I transferred $10000.00 AUD from my bank to the Kraken account above which generated inside the kraken app. I had previously completed only one small test transaction which credited my account immediately with no problems. Within literally one minute of my $10000.00AUD transfer reaching the Kraken account kraken support email stating that my account is suspended. I engaged with Kraken chat in the app. Kraken immediately closed my account. Kraken communicate only by email from support@kraken.com. This email address does not reply to direct emails concerning this matter from the verified customers email address or phone. Kraken phone support is UK, USA, EU only. The operators ask for the email address associated with the account and then say support@kraken.com will contact the customer by email and hang up. The support@kraken.com do not send any email and there is no way to contact kraken. They close the account and confiscate $10.000.00 AUD without explanation. My bank has traced the transfer to the account numbers above. The transaction completed successfully instantly. I believe kraken are a practising cash deposit fraud enterprise.

Froze my funds the first day I started to trade – After being completely disappointed with Coinbase for freezing funds and just being a customer service nightmare, I tried Kraken. Same deal basically. Even on relatively small amount of $4,000. They even let me process the transfer but THEN said my account is restricted so I don't have the funds on either end at the moment. At least they actually have reasonable trading fees and have SOME customer support, albeit very slow. still waiting for resolution on this and don't know if it's going to keep on happening in the future. BEWARE however. These big exchanges do whatever they like with no consideration for how that might affect your trading.