Ransomware continues to be a major cybersecurity challenge that impacts us all – from big industry to small businesses to individuals. In 2021, we analyzed trends in ransomware usage and bottled those up in our latest Current Trends in Ransomware Report. Here’s a snapshot of what you’ll find in the report: Double extortion ransomware increased…
On June 25, global anti-money laundering watchdog the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) completed a much anticipated plenary in which delegates finalized work in a number of important regulatory reports and guidance affecting Virtual Asset Service Providers worldwide. While a majority of the work finalized in this plenary won’t be released until the end of…
In the wake of the Colonial Pipeline and JBS hacks, cybercrime and ransomware attacks continue to be top of mind for global corporations. As consumer purchasing moved to online transactions (digital trade) during the COVID-19 pandemic, the incidence of cybercrime also grew. FBI Director Christopher Wray recently compared the bureau’s shift to global ransomware threats…
TL;DR: Iron.Finance depends on arbitrage as their stabilizing mechanism for partially collateralized tokens. In the case of the TITAN token collapse, the time frame between its price feed oracle and the actual real-time prices of the market was too large causing users to become unprofitable and not protect the stabilization. As a result, TITAN dropped…
The following is an excerpt from our Cryptocurrency Crime and Anti-Money Laundering Report. Since monitoring sanctions-related IP usage across the Bitcoin blockchain, CipherTrace has detected more than 72,000 unique Iranian IP addresses linked to more than 4.5 million unique Bitcoin addresses. These Iranian IP addresses were either involved in direct cryptocurrency transactions or were used… Read more
SANCTIONS UPDATE: On April 15, 2021, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned 16 individuals and 16 entities for attempting to undermine and influence the 2020 US presidential election. The sanctions list includes Russian officials, proxies, and intelligence agencies linked to the Internet Research Agency (IRA)—a Russian “troll farm”…
On March 19, 2021, global anti-money laundering watchdog the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) released a public consultation for its updated Draft Guidance on a Risk-Based Approach to Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers. Key changes in the draft guidance include: DEXs and crypto escrow services are considered Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) Stablecoins… Read more
As DeFi protocols continue to heat up within the Ethereum ecosystem, CipherTrace is seeing more and more exploits and attack vectors come to light. This past week, on December 28th, 2020, Cover Protocol’s shield mining contract, Blacksmith, was exploited. Hackers used a bug in the mining contract to mint an infinite amount of COVER tokens…
FinCEN Takes a Measured Approach to Money Laundering Risks Posed by Unhosted CVC Wallets On December 18, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) released a proposed rule change for virtual currency transactions with unhosted wallets. Under the proposed change, banks and money services businesses (MSBs) would be required to verify the identity of their customer… Read more
In a December 9 CipherTrace-ACFCS Webinar on “How Cryptocurrency Intelligence Tipped the Scales in 2020 Sanctions Evasion,” over 500 attendees from various Financial Institutions were asked if they felt confident detecting cryptocurrency related payments flowing through their institutions and/or investigations. Over three-quarters—78.2%—of attendees responded that they do not feel confident in detecting crypto-related payments flowing…