I think if the USDT hadn't been frozen and the hacker had succeeded in getting funds through the mixer, this story would have played out differently, but as you said, we'll likely never know the true intentions of the hacker.

I read your article and it was a pretty good take on it! And my argument against direct community policing, like blocking wallets on the blockchain directly, or forcing all of the DEXs to maintain blocklists, is that it becomes a slippery slope.

The ideals of crypto in general is to be open and uncensored, and if we start leveraging the technology to start blocking things, where exactly does that line get drawn at? Who gets to be the final authority in the case of a mistake being made and someone getting blocked unjustly?

I don't know that there is a "good" option in these instances, other than trying to head them off at a centralized point where crypto gets turned into fiat, but I don't think mandating DeFi protocols or the blockchains themselves to handle it is the right move either.