Three government bodies in Germany have shut down 47 illegal crypto exchanges and have their eyes set on the criminal users.
German authorities, including The Public Prosecutor General’s Office in Frankfurt, the Central Office for Combating Cybercrime, and the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA), have taken down 47 illegal exchanges operating in the country.
A translated version of the release issued by the three agencies read, “The operators of the exchange services that have now been shut down are accused of deliberately concealing the origin of criminally obtained funds on a large scale through inadequate implementation of legal requirements for combating money laundering.”
Those using these exchanges derived their revenues from cybercrime like deploying ransomware, operating botnets, and service providers on the dark web. Since their revenues came from tainted sources, these exchanges acted as the perfect gateways for them to funnel their funds into the mainstream financial system.
These agencies now plan on prosecuting criminals involved in using the exchanges to launder their ill-gotten funds. Dubbed the ‘Operation Final Exchange,’ the efforts of the agencies that brought these platforms down will now go toward tracing as many individuals and syndicates that laundered their money. A warning on the government operation’s website read, “We have found their servers and seized them – development servers, production servers, backup servers. We have their data – and therefore we have your data.” It added, “Our search for traces begins. See you soon.”
Authorities May Not Be Able to Get to All Perpetrators
Still, the authorities admitted they would not be able to prosecute every criminal that used these platforms. The criminals stretch far and wide across the globe, preventing the organizations from taking foreign bad actors down. “Since cybercriminals often reside abroad and are tolerated or even protected by some countries, they often remain inaccessible to German law enforcement,” the release read.
