While Energi Core continues to be a workplace that respects and protects people's fundamental rights and privacy, Energi has decided to make a public statement in response to publicly disseminated false accusations from a disgruntled and troubled former team member.

Andrey Galkin has publicly posted a series of false claims and allegations about Energi alongside bizarre and unreasonable demands. These claims include that Andrey is the creator of Energi Gen 3, that Energi is keeping exchange deposits closed without a valid reason, that Energi is a scam, that Energi should halt the blockchain, and others. Energi Core unequivocally and absolutely refutes these claims. These are the claims of a former team member whose engagement with Energi Core was terminated after multiple disciplinary actions. Energi Core considers it to be self-evident that Andrey has made these claims for the sole purpose of doing harm to Energi Core and the Energi Community.

In a peculiar show of instability, Andrey has publicly declared that contracts which he signed do not apply to him. Though Andrey has re-written much of the code for Energi Gen 3, perhaps in some plan to later make these fraudulent claims of ownership, work on Energi Gen 3 started long before Andrey was even involved. Energi Gen 3 was and continues to be produced as a collaborative effort of work from many Energi Core team members. All intellectual property rights for these designs as well as code produced under a working agreement with Energi Core are exclusively assigned to Energi Core.

These claims are very revealing about Andrey's character and publicly show issues similar to those Energi Core faced while working with him. Energi Core terminated Andrey's working agreement as a result of repeated misconduct against other Energi Core team members and a reckless attitude toward development that puts the entire Energi community at risk. While we are working hard to solve bugs in code Andrey wrote, it is of the utmost importance that we approach development in a way that provides the maximum protection to our users. To this end please reference this article which explains in detail why we have exchange deposits closed: https://medium.com/energi/important-update-exchange-deposits-8aad7a120b3e. The Energi Core development team has been working overtime to definitively solve these issues so exchanges may safely re-open as soon as possible.

During the same time that Energi is working hard to resolve these issues, Andrey is attacking the project in any avenue he finds, such as e-mailing exchanges asking them to de-list us, demanding that we halt the blockchain, and other hyperbolic demands which it is explicitly clear are designed solely to harm Energi and Energi users. This has put a strain on our resources as we are forced to respond to damaging claims. While we are working hard on solutions, Andrey has created multiple fake accounts with which to respond to similarly fake posts. Perhaps worst of all this is not merely trolling - Andrey is openly communicating with Bashful, a wanted criminal in multiple jurisdictions and one of the largest scammers in the cryptocurrency space. We have offered a bounty for information leading to the arrest of "Bashful", as he is a major threat who has already caused significant damages to Energi users.

Energi Gen 3 has some of the most forward thinking and advanced features of any blockchain. These include a powerful self governance mechanism that we have fully described in this article: https://medium.com/energi/how-were-putting-security-at-the-heart-of-energi-6c6dd463a818. Self-governance affords Energi stakeholders the capability to protect each other. This eliminates the need for traditional processes, including time-consuming court orders, even when a malicious actor steals victims' funds. Self-governance allows Energi to directly target malicious actors and that is EXACTLY what was done in the scenario Andrey shared. Again, his short-term thinking is not aligned with our long-term strategic vision, and this is now resulting in one-sided, self-serving claims.

At Energi we treasure our values: we take a strong stance against scammers, hackers, and other malicious actors and will always strive to provide the best for our community and users. Energi was founded out of love, and we are very proud of our accomplishments. We have conducted the most successful airdrop in the history of cryptocurrency giving away over $6.5 MILLION DOLLARS worth of Energi to real users. We have a self-funded philanthropy initiative called Energi Impact dedicated to doing good in the world. We have consistently met our roadmap goals and we have succeeded where many have failed. Energi was created to make the world a better place, and we have a long history of making good on our mission one step at a time - and we will continue to do so. Our values are expressed clearly on the "Join Our Team" page found here https://www.energi.world/join-our-team/. It is quite obvious from the posts made by Andrey that his values are not in alignment with our own.

Let us make it abundantly clear that we do not intend to allow anyone to harm the project or its users in any way, which is why we have decided to make this statement. We will exhaust all legal remedies to protect our users from malevolent actors. We as a company wish to make a clear and unambiguous statement that there is no substance to any of the allegations posted. The posts themselves constitute civil and criminal violations under US and EU law.

The Energi Legal Team is currently reviewing the best options for defense, including civil and criminal action. Energi is committed to the protection of our community and will zealously enforce all rights and remedies in this regard.