Dogecoin gaining popularity for illegal activities, Elliptic report says
The popular memetic cryptocurrency Dogecoin (DOGE) is becoming more and more associated with several illegal activities such as terrorist financing, Ponzi schemes and child sexual abuse. New report by Elliptic.
In its report, blockchain analytics firms revealed that the meme coins popularized by Elon Musk have become a popular choice for malicious individuals to facilitate millions of transactions.
Most of this activity consists of fraud, fraud, and Ponzi schemes, but it also includes the most serious types of crime, such as terrorist financing and child sexual abuse material (CSAM) distributors.
In July 2021, the Israeli Counterterrorism State Authority issued a foreclosure order against 84 cryptographic addresses believed to be related to the Hamas Group. One of those purses contained $ 40,235 in Dogecoin.
In addition, analytics firms have found that a small but growing number of CSAM vendors, both inside and outside the darknet, are currently receiving Bitcoin. Elliptics identified only $ 3000 in Dogecoin, which is a small amount.
However, he warned that this could represent a growing “criminal desire to adopt a wide range of crypto assets to evade notifications.”
Darknet accepting Dogecoin
Some darknet markets and malware campaigns also accept Dogecoin. Elliptics has identified darknet services, such as Just-Kill, that still accept Dogecoin but not other services.
In addition to terrorists, far-right militant groups also preferred cryptocurrencies, including Dogecoin. These groups, far-right blog sites, news, and video sharing platforms use Dogecoin to raise money when traditional methods are not available.
Infowars is one such website. The far-right fighting globalism news website has raised over $ 1,700 in Dogecoin.
This finding is similar to last year’s exposure of the Financial Activities Task Force on the far-right group using cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Privacy Coin.
However, Ponzi schemes, theft, and fraud appear to be the greatest illegal use of Dogecoin. Elliptics claims to have identified more than 50 cases where criminals monetized millions of dollars in Dogecoin.
Popular cases include the $ 119 million theft of Dogecoin associated with last year’s Turkish Ponzi scheme. In 2020, the Chinese government also seized more than $ 20 million in DOGE under the $ 6 billion PlusTokenPonzi scheme.
