How much do criminals use digital assets?
Entities involved in illicit activity received some $5bn in digital asset funds in 2020 and sent a similar amount. Those sums, from blockchain data provider Chainalysis, represent less than 1 per cent of overall cryptocurrency flows, however, and are dwarfed by the $1.6tn in cash that is laundered annually, according to UN estimates.
Nevertheless, the freewheeling, loosely regulated world of digital assets has earned a reputation for facilitating crime, given the lack of checks and balances on the system in its early years. The net has been tightening as regulators circle and cryptocurrency businesses develop tools to root out questionable activity. But the use of digital assets for crimes such as scams and ransomware demands persists.
Why do criminals use digital assets?
The attraction of digital assets for criminals is that they afford varying levels of anonymity, depending on the particular asset. This can make them a tool to facilitate money laundering, for example.