Dealing with cryptocurrency exchanges can be rather problematic at times. With so many smaller altcoin exchanges out there, it’s become difficult to trust these companies overall. At the same time, smaller exchanges struggle to build up solid reputations over time. It seems Cryptopia is experiencing some issues as we speak. A lot of people’s accounts have apparently been locked for no apparent reason.

What is Going on With Cryptopia?

It is always interesting to keep tabs on smaller exchanges. In fact, we recently put together a brief list

Such an open-minded approach is always subject to a fair amount of scrutiny. After all, there are a lot of new coins created every week, and most of them will not serve any real purpose whatsoever. This means a lot of money can be made and lost when using platforms such as Cryptopia. Proper vetting of altcoins has still not become an industry-wide standard, for some unknown reason.

That may be the least of Cryptopia’s issues for right now, though. Several platform users have reached out to us to report that their exchange accounts have been locked for no apparent reason. It is not uncommon for exchange operators to flag individual accounts because of some illicit activity. In the case of Cryptopia, it seems this problem is affecting a growing number of users, yet no one knows for sure what the root cause is for this sudden decision.

Moreover, it seems the Cryptopia support team is unable to offer a satisfying explanation. Some of the people who reached out to us have been waiting for more than a month to receive a proper answer. While it is true that most exchanges have seen a large influx of new users as of late, there is no reason to prevent people from using their accounts if they have done nothing wrong. Failing to provide proper customer support will not help matters either; that much is certain.

Whether or not there is sufficient reason to compare Cryptopia with Mt. Gox remains to be seen. Smaller cryptocurrency exchanges will easily get overwhelmed with new users, which can cause a lot of problems in quick succession. Most exchange users will display a healthy amount of patience in waiting to receive an answer and hopefully see their problem resolved. For now, it is unclear what is happening with Cryptopia and how it plans to move forward in this regard.

Relying on centralized exchanges will always remain a problem. They trade security for convenience, which can sometimes have unexpected results. We can only hope decentralized exchanges and even atomic swaps become the new normal sooner rather than later. Cryptocurrency is all about decentralization, and there should be no need for centralized “gatekeepers” whatsoever.