Tagged: money laundering

July 17, 2020 @ 9:20 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

The Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) recently warned local consumers and businesses against the usage of Cryptocurrency Automatic Teller Machines (Crypto ATMs). Crypto ATMs are machines that let individuals purchase and sell digital assets through cash, debit or credit cards or electronic wallets. These machines have… Read More

July 17, 2020 @ 8:59 am By Omar Faridi  |  

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an intergovernmental organization that develops policies to combat money laundering and terrorism financing, recently concluded its year long review of its Travel Rule standards for virtual asset service providers (VASPs). The FATF confirmed that it will be extending its… Read More

June 15, 2020 @ 9:13 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Authorities in China’s Guangdong province have reportedly frozen around 4,000 bank accounts which might be linked to money laundering operations through Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies. Local sources said that Guangdong police officials have identified bank accounts that allegedly belong to virtual currency over-the-counter (OTC)… Read More

May 18, 2020 @ 11:04 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

A lawsuit was filed on May 16, 2020, against HDR Global Trading Ltd, the parent company of the Hong Kong-operated Bitcoin Mercantile Exchange (BitMEX), a leading digital currency derivatives exchange that averages billions of dollars worth of daily trading volume. The 106-page lawsuit has also… Read More

February 13, 2020 @ 11:58 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Jamal El-Hindi, deputy director at the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), a bureau of the US Treasury Department that analyzes information about financial transactions in order to prevent illicit activities, is calling on firms interested in bridging the cryptocurrency space with social media networks and… Read More

January 20, 2020 @ 1:21 pm By Samantha Hurst  |  

UK-based next-generation banking platform Cashaa recently announced the launch of its new “Crypto Business/Broker” account. According to Cashaa, the account was created to ensure crypto businesses/brokers are compliant with the FCA’s new rules for anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist finance and Fifth Money Laundering Directive (5AMLD)…. Read More

January 16, 2020 @ 9:58 am By Omar Faridi  |  

Chainalysis, a leading blockchain analytics and cybersecurity firm, revealed on January 15, 2020 that it had managed to trace $2.8 billion in Bitcoin (BTC) being transferred to criminals via cryptocurrency exchanges in 2019, with the vast majority of these transactions going through Binance and Huobi,… Read More

December 8, 2019 @ 6:26 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Ukraine’s government has reportedly approved the nation’s final draft of a new money laundering law that applies to virtual assets (or cryptocurrencies) and virtual asset service providers (VASPs), according to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) guidelines. The Rada, the country’s legislative body, released a… Read More

November 22, 2019 @ 4:00 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

TRM, a digital currency compliance and risk management service provider, recently revealed that it has acquired $4.2 million in funding from Blockchain Capital, Initialized Capital, PayPal Ventures, and Y Combinator. As noted in a release, TRM has raised a total of $5.9 million through its… Read More

November 20, 2019 @ 8:38 am By JD Alois  |  

Elliptic, a provider of crypto-asset risk management solutions, has launched a monitoring system for XRP (Ripple) transactions. Simultaneously, Elliptic claims they have identified “$400 million of illicit activity” without naming perpetrators nor specifically what type of illegal transactions are taking place. Elliptic notes that this… Read More

November 18, 2019 @ 5:59 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

Peer-to-peer (P2P) bitcoin exchange LocalBitcoins has registered with the Finnish Financial Supervisory Authority, FIN-FSA, the financial regulatory authority of the Finnish government. Earlier this month, Crowdfund Insider reported that five different virtual asset service providers (VASPs) had been approved and LocalBitcoins was in the mix… Read More

October 16, 2019 @ 3:14 pm By Omar Faridi  |  

CipherTrace, the leading provider of cryptocurrency intelligence and blockchain security, announced on October 15 the launch of a comprehensive virtual asset tracing capability.  According to a press release shared with Crowdfund Insider, CipherTrace customers can trace Bitcoin (BTC) transactions and over 700 digital tokens following… Read More

September 24, 2019 @ 7:49 am By Omar Faridi  |  

AUSTRAC, Australia’s financial intelligence agency, ordered an audit on September 24 of international money transfers made by online payment service provider PayPal according to a release. Australia’s authorities suspect that the transactions facilitated by PayPal might be associated with serious crimes such as child exploitation. … Read More

September 21, 2019 @ 11:52 am By Omar Faridi  |  

South Korean digital asset exchange Upbit announced on September 20 that it will delist several privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies including Monero (XMR), Dash (DASH), and ZCash (ZEC). Upbit’s management noted in a blog post that it would also cease trading for PIVX, a privacy-focused proof-of-stake (PoS) currency… Read More

August 31, 2019 @ 12:08 pm By Cali Haan  |  

An Australian living in Boulder, Colorado has been sentenced to one year and a day in prison and 12 months probation for laundering money using Bitcoins. Emilio Testa, age 32, was arrested after selling bitcoins to undercover agents. “According to the stipulated facts contained in… Read More

August 30, 2019 @ 6:51 am By Cali Haan  |  

Content warning: This article contains brief descriptions of the abuse of children. Reader discretion is advised. Cryptocurrencies are making cyber-crime, terror financing, money laundering and child exploitation much easier, Neil Walsh, chief of the Cybercrime and Anti-Money-Laundering section of the United Nation’s Office on Drugs and Crime… Read More

August 27, 2019 @ 10:30 am By Cali Haan  |  

A young man in Los Angeles has pleaded guilty to charges of drug dealing, unlicensed money transmitting and money laundering relating to the processing of $25 million USD in illicit money via his Bitcoin trading services. Kunal Kalra, 25, also known as “Kumar,” “shecklemayne” and… Read More

August 6, 2019 @ 2:40 am By Cali Haan  |  

Police Major Gen Preecha Charoensahayanon, chief of Thailand’s Anti-Money Laundering Office (AMLO) says cryptocurrencies, “will be a tool of new money laundering,” in the country going forward. “That’s why we’re amending laws to prepare us for new online missions,” Charoensahayanon told The Bangkok Post. Charoensahayanon… Read More

July 18, 2019 @ 9:20 pm By Cali Haan  |  

A young student at Moscow State University, Alexey Andryunin, and his unnamed partner, have come up with a lucrative sideline that has made them much less interested in their studies: the wash trading of crypto tokens to make it look like there’s a market for… Read More

June 7, 2019 @ 6:54 am By Cali Haan  |  

Police in Vancouver have reportedly called Bitcoin ATMs “an ideal money-laundering vehicle” and have asked for federal legislation, and the mayor of Vancouver, the first city in the world to host a Bitcoin ATM, has now floated the idea of a ban, The Star reports…. Read More