Topic: Crypto criminal activities. (Read 373 times)

It is an act of being centeredness for one to assume that every source to scam is coming from the cryptocurrency network forgetting that things like this have longed ago been existing and yet the government have nothing to do about it, i will rather admit and put it this way that cryptocurrency has come to make sure that we have our individual control over our finances and will be responsible for the loss if anything happens to them becau it's our fault base on how we handles it.

Also in cryptocurrency, it is very important that we treat every possible ways or means that can be used effectively to tackle our digital assets by ensuring safety precautions and practice on them, such could be by avoiding malicious and physhing attempt through links or mails, irrelevant downloads and sites we visit and also making use of a safety wallet like that found with cold storages or by running a bitcoin full node, this are many ways we can be prevented by scam or any illicit crypto activities that may lead to loss of our bitcoin or any crypto we possess.

The latest links you provided prove one more thing.. not only these crimes existed before Bitcoin, not only that fiat provides more opportunities for crime than Bitcoin. But it might even be easier for authorities to detect crime and eliminate it from the system if they gather enough information to separate good from bad and focus on the bad. It’s not as crime-friendly as they wanted us to believe it is if they’re catching criminals, is it?

Now the question remains.. if they separate good from bad, will they focus just on the bad? Or will they start supervising the good as well? And we already know the answer… Bitcoin can help find criminals easier, but the gov is using their power to a larger extent than they should be allowed to.

I disagree, even without cryptocurrency the crime will proliferate.  The people behind crypto crimes are also people behind crimes that uses fiat money.  They just move to crypto sphere because it is easier to swindle people since crypto is a new craze.


Scammers work 24/7, it is not the access on crypto but the activity of scammers using social medias and other communicating platform to entice unsuspecting victims into entering their trap.

You are right that because of crypto, illegal activities have increased a lot as compared to the time when there was no crypto. The scammer did exist even before the existence of cryptocurrencies but now it is easy to scam people mainly due to two reasons. First, the crypto is easily transferable anywhere so the scammer now targets people worldwide and is not limited to certain regions or areas.

Secondly, since everyone can access crypto at any time, the audience to whom the scammer can target also has increased. Previously only a few people could access and transfer money online through credit cards but now due to crypto everyone can transfer money worldwide.

If we talk about criminals who use cryptocurrency for their crimes, then in recent years, in a significant number of cases, people suffer from the so-called “pig butchering”. Fraudsters ingratiate themselves with people and offer to invest in cryptocurrency, but either the cryptocurrency they offer turns out to be fraudulent, or they completely imitate the existence of some cryptocurrency, and simply take the money for themselves. Since many people have very little understanding of cryptocurrencies, this unfortunately works! If possible, you should warn your friends that investing in cryptocurrencies on the advice of unfamiliar people from the Internet is extremely unsafe.

More about “pig butchering” https://www.michigan.gov/ag/consumer-protection/consumer-alerts/consumer-alerts/scams/cryptocurrency-scam-pig-butchering

Some updated topic(2022-2023) created about these criminals activities you may read.
Tax evasion
UK makes first seizure of NFTs in tax crackdown ($ 1.9 million fraud) created by:bitmover
Coinbase CTO lose his 1million bet created by: Wapfika
[2022-01-01] Indian Authorities Raid Cryptocurrency Exchanges for Tax Evasion created by:
zasad@
Ponzi Schemes
Ponzi scheme scammer uses BTC to cover tracks created by:WeThePeople
Bitcoin and Ponzi Schemes - People are confused. created by:Kakmakr
Ponzi Schemes created by: Husires
Money Laundering
Bitcoin is not a safe haven for criminals created by:Accardo
NFT for money laundering? created by:bbc.reporter
Larry Fink (BlackRock) predicts end of globalisation and crypto-boom created by:Pawgo
Indian MP Says Crypto Is Used For Bribes & Money Laundering created by:coinshots
Asking for Ransom
Hackers exploit critical VMware flaw to drop ransomware & miners created by:Pawgo
The madness of gambling addicts. created by:macson
Hackers Demand Bitcoin as Ransom in Romania created by:DiMarxist
Changelly Holds Coin Ransom without KYC, Will Not Return to Sender created by:ctsbitcoin

I also read a lot of information that the figure that is attributed to money laundering in cryptocurrency is negligible. Because banks understand that cryptocurrencies are more profitable when transferring money, they have found a serious competitor in it. It is much easier for fraudsters to take advantage of money laundering methods that have worked for centuries than to start learning about Bitcoin.

Be that as it may, but banks today are very careful with all kinds of operations with cryptocurrency. For example, a warning by FinCEN’s director says that strict control is needed when interacting with cryptocurrency.

https://pro-blockchain.com/en/fincen-director-notes-improved-oversight-of-cryptocurrency-industry

I agree with you 100%. I hated that argument that lots of crimes are committed using BTC. There are crimes committed using BTC same as there are crimes that are committed using anything that ever existed. There are bad actors in all industries.

People seem to forget that fiat make like 98% or even 99% of the crimes if we are talking about crypto vs fiat argument. It is media that is pushing this story, but anyone that goes into crypto and learns is aware that there are scams, but they are much easier to avoid then all the IRL crime out there.

Politicians and wealthy people commit crimes over people daily, billions in play.

Rather than focusing on fiat instead of crypto crimes as some users above my reply say, I think it'd be even better to do a comparison between the amount of crimes there are in fiat vs crypto for all these four categories. It shows even better how uncomparable these two economies are when it comes to illegalities.

As I said before, if we wanted to fix crimes, we should first of all fix the most pronounced ones which are, in the largest part, committed by corrupt politics and wealthy men. We can't point fingers towards something that has only appeared one decade ago when we have crimes that have been going on and repeating for centuries yet nobody ever took care of them properly.

These are just four only but it took a lot of time to be a constructive post I want to give a thumbs up to OP. Those lists are so helpful.

Most of the time those are the common things we experience in cryptocurrency but I always see the victim is on the Ponzi scheme this is the most popular among them because the target is the newbies who are just starting yet on making investments.

On ransomware, those are the people who only have a large amount of money.

This kind of crime is working even in different kind of investments.

Thank you for appreciating and correcting some information, the information above is a little bit altered. Those criminal activities are already active in real life, there are many people who do that thing just to have some money and these activities increases because of the cryptocurrency, I already experienced some of them, especially the Ponzi scheme, wherein I lost my money because I trust the website and I don't have that good knowledge before to identify whethere it is legit or not.

I see the effort of creating the thread, but there are 2 important things you need to empathize :
1. All those criminal activities are exist before cryptocurrency exist and can be done with fiat
2. Blockchain offer some privacy by default, but it doesn't offer anonymity (unless you coin such as Monero), but only pseudonymity. Additionally government could track someone's coin on easily.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies makes payment more easy, and bitcoin specifically brough decentralization to the world, it has been very a good thing that has been embraced by people in the world, that is why the rate of adoption has been always increasing. If I like, I can make use of bitcoin to pay people from abroad, instead of the restrictions caused by governmental laws.

This topic should be focused on fiats and not cryptocurrencies. I still know how many football players do evade tax not to talk of politicians/politicos. I have thought of it and looked for ways people can evade tax, if a company is in a country, governments can do it in a way the company and its workers will pay tax, even if they pay workers with bitcoin. That should not be an excuse but the governments to be blamed if they are not taking necessary actions to make sure the companies in their country are not evading tax. If tax can happen in crypto, that means it is happening most in fiat in such country.

About money laundering, I hope you know what united states SEC addresses about this after many investigation they make, although, it is very possible money laundering to be common in cryptocurrencies later, but as of now, money laundering in cryptocurrencies is nothing to be compared to money laundering in fiats. I hope you read on news the recent $2 trillion malicious activities that has been existing for years in top banks of the world.

About ransom, this is common even before the creation of bitcoin in 2009, in a way hackers encrypt a company or someone's data and request for random. The ransom can be collected in cryptocurrencies but also can be collected in fiat which is even the origin. How about the criminal cases that someone can be stolen, or many other things like that, that the criminals will demand for ransom in fiats which is even common in that case.

About ponzi, the first ponzi I know in my life is MMM, it is a fiat ponzi, what is the origin of ponzi, is it not fiats? It is. I understand your points, but we have to let people know that these are mostly happening while using fiats. Bitcoin and legit cryptocurrencies are not scam, it is people that are the real scam, and they make use of fiats more than cryptocurrencies for their malacious acrivities. I expect this article to be how to avoid all these rather than depicting cryptocurrencies this way. 

Before the advent of BTC and cryptocurrency, these crimes has existed and a lot of them gone unaccounted for. Some cases can result in murder which is rather rare or impossible in cryptocurrency. Crimes on the cryptosphere is made possible by you (the owner of an account/wallet). You open the door way and make this possible by the series of reckless activities you do without close investigation on what platform you give your subscribe to, pay less attention to security and allow greed cloud your sense of reasoning when it comes to investment (Ponzi schemes).
Using cryptocurrency as an exchange point for ransom doesn't really mean, the ransom couldn't be done anywhere. Probably, it reduces the risk for scammers, hackers and what have you but then, it's always your choice to give in to using it as a payment means or not. As for as blockchain technology is concerned, it is a legitimate transaction so long as it follows the rules of cryptocurrency. You can't blame it for being that way. It's more like making transfers with the ATM machine to some other account and you blame it for being possible. Yet the rest of the world looks forward to globalizing the world, payment systems and lots more, yet they put there blames on the success of cryptocurrency in it's global archivement, Ironic!
Hackers and scammers have got you on the hook for what they've got against you and you've got them on the hook for what they need from you (the value attached is both ways) as per ransom.
Tax evasion is just a way into centralization and the cryptosphere operates a decentralization system so, the rest of the world not in line with it have just got to live with it.
After all, we've been living with hackers and scammers all along. We are still managing them.
Your security is your number one priority as any recklessness from you remains, detrimental to only you!

Good lists, I saw some of my threads are included there. If I may add, I think it's better if you would include the author of thread as well? Or you can add this as well:

Ponzi Scheme 101 by xha-256

Cryptocurrency is now being prominent all over the world, it is really good for having an online financial system which can make you satisfied because you don't need to go to any banks or do some manual transactions of yours and because of this cryptocurrency the criminal activities also rise up again, there are some tax evasion, money laundering, Ponzi schemes, kidnapping and theft and asking for cryptocurrency as ransom, it makes some criminal to do an action without thinking that they would be trace because of having privacy in the crypto world.

Lists of threads of 4 Criminal activities:
1. Tax evasion - it happens when a person or a business illegally avoids paying of tax, it commonly happens to the crypto world. There are a million transactions of cryptocurrency that has not been reported because they think that they may not be caught because of having privacy on it.

Some threads talking about tax evasion:
Taxes on Bitcoins: Unreasonable or essential?
Korea proposes 20% tax on crypto trading starting 2021
Bitcoin taxation infographic.Any suggestions to improve?
Government Taxing Bitcoin? Here's the Answer
Hacker Stole 1,000 Traders’ Personal Data From CryptoTrader.Tax
U. S. Congress proposes to free small cryptocurrency transactions from taxes
Get ready for more tax. Save your BTC!
Brief: IRS adjusts crypto tax policies in the US

2. Money laundering - it is an illegal activity of making large money from criminal activities. Cryptocurrency provides a good benefit for any business and company to have access to financial products and services and because of cryptocurrency there is 90% of money laundering are still undetected, it would be easy for any organization to do such things because it can be done through online with privacy as well.

Threads talking about money laundering:
Banks Launder $2 Trillion While Claiming BTC Is For Money Laundering?
Crypto Exchange Owner Admits Laundering $1.8M in Online Auctions Fraud
2 Chinese charged with laundering money from exchange hack
Ohio Resident Charged With Laundering $311M in Bitcoin for AlphaBay
Some gamblers have been arrested in Bangladesh for money laundering through btc
Binance sued for money laundering over stolen bitcoin.
Fiat vs Crypto in money laundering
[2016-01-12] Grams & Helix previous owner arrested for money laundering 350k BTC
Have there been any money laundering schemes that used cryptocurrency?

3. Ponzi schemes - it is an investment that will pay you using the money of the other investors, so basically it is like a pyramid, those people who are at the bottom will suffer for this, they are common offers some good returns, beginners are commonly the victims of it. It also happens in real life and I already have many experiences about it. There are so many Ponzi schemes in the virtual world as well because there are many people who are using cryptocurrency and it makes those scammers or criminals secured their identity.

Some threads talking about Ponzi schemes:
Why bitcoin never a ponzi
Ponzi Schemes for dummies
Indian Govt thinks Bitcoin is a Ponzi scheme
Police arrest alleged mastermind of $722 million Bitcoin Ponzi scheme

4. Asking for ransom - It sometimes happens when there is a criminal or hackers who steal important data, information of the person or company and then they will ask for the ransom which is a cryptocurrency, they choose cryptocurrency rather than fiat to have better transaction and to avoid having any attachment to the company. It would be safe for the criminals if they ask for cryptocurrency compared to fiat.

Some threads related for asking a ransom:
[GUIDE] Beginners Protect Yourself from Ransomware!!!
Ransomware removing tools
A hacker gang is wiping Lenovo NAS devices and asking for ransoms
New ransomware variant targeting Mac OS users
{Warning}: New Avaddon Ransomware relaunch with IMG attachment
Ragnar Locker ransomware deploys virtual machine to dodge security,
New Corona Virus Crypto Ransomware
A ransom attack on Trezor's and KeepKey's passphrase handling
New ransomware hits Italy via fake Covid-19 map
[Warning]:Kupidon ransomware
British Court Freezes $860,000 in Bitcoin Linked to Ransomware Payout
Ransomware and all kinds of attack, in our computer asking for BTC payment


Sources: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1057567719827051?journalCode=icja#:~:text=The%20criminal%20activities%20extend%20to,the%20presumed%20privacy%20and%20anonymity.
https://www.winheller.com/en/banking-finance-and-insurance-law/bitcoin-trading/bitcoin-and-tax/cryptocurrency-tax-evasion.html
https://www.google.com/amp/s/cointelegraph.com/news/comparing-money-laundering-with-cryptocurrencies-and-fiat/amp
https://www.nuwireinvestor.com/can-investors-recognize-bitcoin-ponzi-schemes/