In a filing on Thursday, the United States Department of Justice asked to seize $1 billion from an unnamed hacker. Specifically, the DoJ is asking the court of the Northern District of California to lock down on "approximately 69,370.22491543 Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Gold (BTG), Bitcoin SV (BSV), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), obtained from 1HQ3Go3ggs8pFnXuHVHRytPCq5fGG8Hbh." The court document did not identify the person behind the wallet, instead referring to them as "Individual X," but it does allege that they managed to hack Silk Road and steal the crypto, much to the chagrin of Ross Ulbricht. The hacker apparently already agreed to sign …

The United States Attorney General’s Cyber-Digital Task Force recently unveiled the result of its months-long effort to evaluate emerging cryptocurrency-related threats and articulate law enforcement strategies for countering them. The resulting guidance leaves the reader with an impression that its authors have a sound understanding of how the focal asset class works as well as a certain fixation on the ways it can be misused, as some observers contend. In the highly charged atmosphere of the final weeks before the presidential election, with high-profile enforcement actions against the people behind crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX and the U.S. government’s sweeping anti-monopoly …

The United States is girding its loins for an election that has cast a pall over a far longer timeframe than we ever should have let it. But then again, what did you expect when so many people spent so much of the past year cut off from their normal lives and circles, growing increasingly dependent on social media as a way of connecting with the outside world? That's not a recipe for sanity, even if it was a race between sane people. The phenomenon of modern information flow has gotten an enormous amount of attention since the last, similarly …

As technology titans in the United States capture a larger part of their industries and beyond, regulators and governments have become increasingly concerned about their extensive power and influence. Indeed, Facebook, Twitter and Google’s parent company Alphabet all appeared before a Congressional antitrust in July. The primary concern of the government is that these companies use their authority to stifle competition and manipulate users to maintain their leading position in the marketplace. The latest in a series of ongoing antitrust charges and investigations on corporate giants is the one being considered by the U.S. . The DOJ said in a …

The ease of laundering money in the U.S. before 1970 boggles the mind. Prior to the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) of that year, there were no federal standards for banks to keep records on activity that fell under the category of “suspicious.” There were also no consistent reporting requirements — it was the BSA that established the $10,000 threshold that stands to this day. But it’s not like the BSA banished money laundering from U.S. shores. It wouldn’t even be until 1986 that money laundering was classified as a federal crime — a landmark in global anti-money laundering. Despite that …

The United States faces a growing threat of transnational cybercrime, particularly against its financial system. In what may be the largest prosecution of its kind in U.S. history, the U.S. Department of Justice has charged Texas tech billionaire Bob Brockman in a 39-count indictment with evading $2 billion in taxes. The businessman used encrypted devices and code words to conceal his wire fraud, tax fraud and money laundering within a network of offshore entities and bank accounts. As the CEO of Reynolds and Reynolds Co., Brockman contributed 6.4% to the United States’ current annual deficit of $3.1 trillion — more …

A line from immortal comic strip Calvin & Hobbes goes “a good compromise leaves everybody mad.” When it comes to laws governing crypto, authorities are usually asking for pretty major compromises because they are, at their very best-intentioned, trying to work things out. While it’s a fast-developing area of law — honestly a treat to cover — that means it’s fast-developing relative to law, not tech. There is an innate conservatism to anything having to do with how people handle their money. That extends to laws governing how money and investments function. Consequently, everything regulators touch in crypto develops slower …

The operator of crypto derivatives exchange BitMEX, 100x Group, has hired a seasoned Anti-Money Laundering (AML) specialist, Malcolm Wright, as its chief compliance officer. In an announcement on Oct. 12, the 100x emphasized Wright's profile as the current chairman of the Advisory Council and AML Working Group at Global Digital Finance, and as a speaker covering key topics that include the Financial Action Task Force's Recommendations for Virtual Asset Service Providers. 100X Group had last week reshuffled its top leadership, removing BitMEX's co-founders Arthur Hayes, Samuel Reed and Ben Delo from executive roles. Hayes, Reed and Delo were all charged …

The U.S. Department of Justice has released an international statement claiming that end-to-end encryption “poses significant challenges to public safety,” including sexually exploited children. In an Oct. 11 statement from the DoJ, the agency called on technology companies to work with the government to find a solution for strong data encryption with the means to allow the investigation of illegal activity and content. The department stated end-to-end encryption that hindered law enforcement from accessing certain content creates “severe risks to public safety.” The statement was signed by the DoJ, the Home Department of the United Kingdom, the Australian Minister for …

Every Friday, Law Decoded delivers analysis on the week’s critical stories in the realms of policy, regulation and law. Editor's note Historians typically date the birth of international policing as we know it today to the 1800s, a response to the explosion in nationalist movements and non-governmental political radicalism in Europe. Just as new linking technologies like the telegraph and the steam engine aided and abetted new networks of political deplorables and any number of Sherlock Holmes plots, the explosion of communications tech of the last quarter-century has brought about new forms of crime. Which is, y’know, something everyone passively …

The new cryptocurrency enforcement guidelines by the Department of Justice (DoJ) have received a negative response from segments of the crypto community. Published earlier today by the attorney general for the U.S. William Barr, the DOJ report aims to address the “uniquely dangerous threats to public safety” cryptocurrency poses. Citing the words “crime” or “criminal” 168 times in the 83-page document, many in the community have interpreted the DoJ’s position as a direct attack on crypto that labels the entire sector as an avenue for crime. Coinshares’ CSO Meltem Demirors described the policy document as “a commercial reel of every …

The Cryptocurrency Enforcement Framework issued by the U.S. Department of Justice stipulates a number of cases where it will exert its authority over foreign actors: “where virtual asset transactions touch financial, data storage, or other computer systems within the United States”, if they use cryptocurrency to import illegal products into the U.S. and if they “provide illicit services to defraud or steal from U.S. residents”. This also applies to foreign entities that engage in money transmission in the country even if they are incorporated abroad. Additionally, the Department claims to have the authority to prosecute any foreign actors who use …