Smart‑contract disputes have left crypto forums and reached mainstream court dockets. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit’s November 2024 decision in Van Loon v. Treasury overturned OFAC’s sanctions on Tornado Cash by concluding that the protocol’s immutable Ethereum contracts are not “property” subject to federal control. The opinion pushed judges and litigators to examine the code itself its functions, accessibility, and immutability rather than focus solely on the humans who created or used it. Similar questions of contractual intent, venue, and injunctive relief now appear in token‑issuance class actions, decentralized‑finance exploits, and governance‑token fights.
Prevailing in this new arena depends on whether on‑chain records clear the Federal Rules of Evidence. Recent rulings have admitted blockchain histories under Rule 901 when counsel could translate consensus mechanics, forks, and timestamp granularity into plain English. Courts have warned, however, that an unverified block‑explorer screenshot is no more reliable than a random web printout. Practitioners must be prepared to explain how node software versions affect transaction ordering and how hard forks can rewrite ledger history points that go directly to authenticity and hearsay objections.
Legislatures are racing to keep up. More than twenty states now give blockchain records explicit legal effect. Arkansas treats any record “secured through blockchain technology” as an electronic record and signature, while Illinois commands that evidence of a smart contract “must not be excluded solely because a blockchain was used.” At the commercial‑law level, the 2022 Uniform Commercial Code amendments introduced Article 12, defining “controllable electronic records” and establishing negotiability rules for crypto assets and NFTs. New York enacted those amendments in June 2025, with an effective date six months after the governor’s signature, signaling that digital‑asset workflows are entering everyday secured transactions practice.
Litigators should therefore build evidentiary readiness into their incident‑response playbooks. Best practice is to capture a full‑node or archival snapshot at the disputed block height, generate Merkle proofs of every relevant transaction, and store both the data and the hash values in tamper‑evident media. Retaining private key control lets counsel sign an affidavit from the originating wallet, cementing the link between the affiant and the on‑chain activity. A documented chain of custody who accessed the snapshot, when, and for what purpose mirrors traditional digital‑forensics protocols while preserving cryptographic integrity.
Contract drafters should be equally proactive. Smart‑contract terms ought to specify the governing chain (Layer 1 versus Layer 2), the block height at which obligations arise, procedures for divergent fork histories, and an off‑chain notarization method for code updates and event logs. These provisions minimize costly jurisdiction fights and ensure critical evidence survives discovery even when networks evolve.
The takeaway is clear: smart contracts are enforceable only if their evidentiary foundations withstand judicial scrutiny. Mastery of both blockchain mechanics and fast‑moving statutory frameworks will allow counsel to authenticate or to attack on‑chain evidence and shape the next generation of technology disputes.
Subscribe to our Newsletter
Stay Ahead in the Cyber Law Landscape – Sign Up for Our Newsletter Today and Never Miss an Update from Legal Cyber Academy!