South Korean Financial Watchdog Releases Stricter AML Guidelines for Virtual Currencies

South Korea’s top financial regulator has released a set of revised anti-money laundering (AML) guidelines for virtual currencies, according to a press release published this week.

The press release notes that the Financial Services Commission (FSC) conducted on-site inspections of three domestic banks - Nonghyup, Kookmin, and Hana Bank - the results of which prompted the update to AML guidelines.

The new guidelines note that cryptocurrency exchanges must conduct Customer Due Diligence (CDD) and Enhanced Customer Identification (EDD) to ensure the trade purposes and funding sources of users are legitimate. If a business refuses or is unable to provide information for customer verification, the guidelines note that any transactions from that entity must be rejected or terminated.

According to the revised guidelines, crypto exchanges are also responsible for making certain that foreigners are not using local crypto exchanges, criminals are not using the personal accounts of other people to launder money, and that there are no suspicious transactions and payment processing, CCN news site writes.

In May, the FSC joined a cryptocurrency probe already initiated by South Korea’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) into AML compliance with crypto exchanges.