It's in the article:
Why Monero CLI Proves XmrBazaar Mediators Aren't Escrow Services, Per the Letter of the Law
...and Why Sticking to the Letter of the Law May Not Shield You (or the Samourai Devs) from a Desperate State Beast
:
XmrBazaar and its mediators do not provide escrow services.
Not in the legal sense. Not in the historical sense. Not even in the strict dictionary sense.
The word comes from the Old French escroue (literally, a scrap of parchment) because in the 12th century, you’d hand a neutral third party a scroll with the deed to your castle until the other guy delivered the 5,000 sheep (or gold, or whatever) he promised. Fast-forward through crusader trusts, Roman betting slips held by temple priests, and Depression-era California real-estate panics, and we see that for centuries, “escrow” meant one thing: a single trusted entity temporarily takes full custody of the asset. The monk holds the parchment. The title company holds the cash. The moment someone else controls your money or property, it’s escrow, and in most jurisdictions, that third party is a licensed entity holding and transmitting value on your behalf.
Custody = risk. Custody = KYC. Custody = seizures or exit scams.
Instead, we have a contract enforced by mathematics, not a middleman with a vault. The “escrow” wallet isn’t held by anyone: it lives on the Monero blockchain, waiting for any two of the three keyholders to agree. Same outcome as medieval escrow (funds only move when conditions are met), but no single throat to choke.
TL;DR: XmrBazaar has never had escrow in the legal or traditional definition sense.
The platform never touches your coins.
The mediator never touches your coins.
There is no “third party” that holds anything.
What XmrBazaar actually provides is a friendly web interface for creating and managing a native Monero 2-of-3 multisig wallet on-chain:
Buyer gets one private spend key.
Seller gets one private spend key.
Mediator gets one private spend key.
2 out of 3 signatures required to spend. #XMRBazaar
#XMRBazaar
