A surge in cryptocurrency use isn’t surprising, given the widespread adoption. Indeed, with legitimate cryptocurrency use growing significantly faster than criminal use, illicit activity’s percentage of bitcoin trading volume was never smaller. In 2021, cryptocurrency-related crime reached a new peak. In 2019, illegal addresses got $14 billion, climbing from $7.8 billion in 2020. From 2020 to 2021, the overall amount of transactions surged by 567% to $15.8T. Despite all of that, crypto is safer than fiat. Changpeng Zhao Claims Crypto is Safer Than Fiat Earlier today, Changpeng Zhao, the founder of Binance, took to his Twitter account to inform his followers why he believes that cryptocurrency is way safer than Fiat. He quoted some crypto crime analysis by Chainalysis and United Nations in his tweet. According to Chainalysis, illegal addresses accounted for only 0.15 percent of total cryptocurrency trading volume in 2021 According to the United Nations. In a single year, money laundering is estimated to be 2-5 percent of worldwide GDP or $800 billion to $2 trillion in US dollars. DeFi Crimes What has changed in the previous 12 months? Let’s start with the forms of cryptocurrency-related crime that grew the highest in trading volume last year. To a lesser extent, stolen money and fraud are two categories that have seen a significant rise. For both, DeFi is a huge part of the tale. In 2021, scamming earnings increased by 82 perce...
