Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis published two recent blog posts providing details on cryptocurrency crime trends. According to one of the blog posts, in 2022, "illicit transaction volume rose for the second consecutive year, hitting an all-time high of $20.1 billion" with 44 percent of illicit transaction volume in 2022 coming from activity associated with sanctioned entities. Among other things, the blog post notes the following: "[t]ransaction volumes fell across all of the other, more conventional categories of cryptocurrency-related crime, with the exception of stolen funds, which rose 7% year-over-year"; "[o]verall, the share of all cryptocurrency activity associated with illicit activity has risen for the first time since 2019, from 0.12% in 2021 to 0.24% in 2022"; and "illicit activity in cryptocurrency remains a small share of overall volume at less than 1%."
A second Chainalysis blog post discusses "how the U.S. government's crypto-related sanctions strategy has evolved over time, examine[s] the types of entities that it has sanctioned so far, and analyze[s] the impact of those sanctions on the entities themselves and the wider crypto crime ecosystem." Among other things, the blog post provides a table that displays "the individuals and entities with cryptocurrency nexuses sanctioned in the U.S. in 2022, along with the reason OFAC sanctioned them."
According to recent reports, the provider of MetaMask, a popular Ethereum self-custodial wallet provider, recently issued a warning to MetaMask users of an "'address poisoning scam,' where attackers 'poison' transaction histories by sending users tokens worth $0 to their wallets." The scammers reportedly use wallet addresses that match the first and last characters of the victim's wallet address to lure victims into sending cryptocurrencies to the wrong "copycat" address. The scam apparently targets MetaMask users who have gotten into the habit of copying their wallet address from their transaction history. MetaMask users are reportedly cautioned to check every single character of wallet addresses before initiating transactions.
For more information, please refer to the following links:
- Chainalysis: 2023 Crypto Crime Trends: Illicit Cryptocurrency Volumes Reach All-Time Highs Amid Surge in Sanctions Designations and Hacking
- Chainalysis: How 2022's Biggest Cryptocurrency Sanctions Designations Affected Crypto Crime
- Scam alert: MetaMask warns crypto users about address poisoning
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