Today, an on-chain address holding over 72 million USDT was directly frozen by Tether. It wasn’t hacked, and it wasn’t a mistaken transfer—Tether actively hit the freeze button. What does this mean? Your USDT isn’t the 'on-chain asset, fully self-controlled' thing you might imagine. As long as Tether determines that your address is problematic (suspected of money laundering, hacking, sanctions, etc.), they can unilaterally turn your USDT into a string of numbers that can’t be transferred. This is the underlying design of USDT as a centralized stablecoin—'decentralization' has nothing to do with the USDT you hold; the freeze switch has always been in Tether’s hands. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing—Tether cooperating with law enforcement to freeze dirty money is standard practice. But you need to clearly understand: the USDT in your wallet doesn’t have the same level of freedom as the ETH in your wallet.