German law enforcement officers have dismantled dozens of crypto exchanges that they accused of making money laundering and other violations possible.
Officers of the Frankfurt am Main Public Office – Central Office for Combating Internet Crime (ZIT) and the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) participated in the operation, which were aimed at 47 fairs.
A message from the BKA claimed that the exchanges deliberately had hidden the origin of criminal funds on a large scale by not performing your customer (KYC) checks. In particular, they have not registered new customers or check them for proof of identity, so that their ‘customers’ can launder funds anonymously in other digital currencies.
In this way the stock markets offered an essential service to cyber criminals such as ransomware actors, Darknet Traders and Botnet operators, the BKA argued.
Read more about Germany Law Enforcement: German police Bust Dark Web Hosting Cyber-Bunker Business
Operation Final Exchange, as it is dubbed, led to the seizure of dozens of servers related to the fairs. That means that researchers will now have many instructions to follow if they try to trace the people who use platforms such as Xchange.cash, MultiChange.net and Coinblinker.com.
“For years, the operators of these criminal exchange services have led you to believe that their hosting cannot be found that they do not store customer data and that all data will be deleted immediately after the transaction. A seemingly non -regulated hub that allows you to make the proceeds of your criminal activities without fear of persecution, the view of our view of the point of view, Police.
“We have found and seized their servers – development servers, production servers, back -up servers. We have their data – and that is why we have your data. Transactions, registration data, IP addresses. Our search for traces starts. See you soon.”
The BKD claimed that in this way an “infrastructure” of cyber crime is taking away, is an important strategy, since many cyber crime groups operate impunity from hostile states such as Russia.
The current efforts follow two remarkable activities in 2023, which led to the removal of productive crypto mixer chip mixer and dark web marketplace kingdom market.