[BreachExchange] Biden administration unveils ‘national cryptocurrency enforcement team’

[Terrell Byrd]

https://nypost.com/2021/10/07/biden-administration-unveils-national-cryptocurrency-enforcement-team/

The Biden administration has unveiled a “national cryptocurrency
enforcement team” tasked with taking on complex investigations and
prosecutions of criminal misuses of cryptocurrency.

The Justice Department unit, which will be helmed by Assistant Attorney
General Kenneth Polite Jr., will focus on “crimes committed by virtual
currency exchanges, mixing and tumbling services, and money laundering
infrastructure actors,” the DOJ said in a statement.

Cryptocurrency mixing and tumbling services charge customers a fee to
launder digital currencies so that the owner and source of the coins are
hidden.

“Today we are launching the National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team to
draw on the Department’s cyber and money laundering expertise to strengthen
our capacity to dismantle the financial entities that enable criminal
actors to flourish — and quite frankly to profit — from abusing
cryptocurrency platforms,” Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said
Wednesday evening in a statement.

“As the technology advances, so too must the Department evolve with it so
that we’re poised to root out abuse on these platforms and ensure user
confidence in these systems.”

The new unit will build upon efforts by the Department of Justice Criminal
Division’s Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Section, Computer Crime and
Intellectual Property Section and other units, the DOJ said.

The NCET will also seek to recover the illegal profit of crimes involving
cryptocurrencies, the department said.

Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Critics of cryptocurrencies have often noted that digital coins are the
payment method of choice among criminals such as drug dealers and
ransomware hackers because the coins are untraceable.

A string of ransomware attacks earlier this year that targeted critical US
infrastructure, including Colonial Pipeline and meat processor JBS USA, all
sought payment in cryptocurrencies.

The formation of the NCET is the White House’s latest effort to crack down
on such cyberattacks and attempt to wrangle the rapidly growing crypto
market under federal regulation.

The feds have already been moving to crack down on illegal cryptocurrency
operators.

Last month, the Biden administration blacklisted a Russian-owned
cryptocurrency exchange, called SUEX OTC, for allegedly helping launder
ransomware payments, marking the first time the Treasury Department had
sanctioned a digital currency platform.
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