Europol: Bitcoin's Popularity Growing in Illicit Online Markets
Bitcoin is increasingly being used to pay for livestreams of child sex broadcasted over illicit Internet sites, according to a new Europol report. Produced by Europol's EC3 cybercrime centre, the report sheds new light on the commercial sexual exploitation of children online, while providing evidence that individuals with a sexual interest in children are becoming more entrepreneurial. "Live streaming of abuse for payment is no longer an emerging trend but an established reality", the report said. It continued: "There is a clear shift from traditional credit card payments to the ones....
Related News
Europol, the European Union's top law enforcement agency in charge of criminal intelligence, is urging legislators to provide law enforcement with greater powers to identify criminal activities online, including digital money laundering. Europol is not a law enforcement agency in the traditional sense, but rather furnishes EU law enforcement agencies with support, including intelligence, information exchange, expertise and training. The organisation launched the European Cybercrime Centre last year, and one of its goals is to target organised groups that make their money online. Digital....
European prosecutors are speaking out about a new pan-European project designed to combat dark markets on the web - and they're addressing bitcoin as a key tool of these illicit bazaars. The Illegal Trade on Online Marketplaces (ITOM) was initiated by the Dutch Public Prosecution Service, the Openbaar Ministrie. Kicking off with a meeting in April this year, the project draws together law enforcement from various European countries in an attempt to stop the illegal trade of goods online. Agencies involved include Europol and law enforcement from the UK, Portugal, and Germany. The project....
Europol, the European Union's law enforcement agency that deals with criminal intelligence is calling for police to be given additional powers when it comes to identifying wrong-doers, particular those who are laundering money using bitcoin and other digital currencies. "We're seeing that virtual currencies are being used as an instrument to facilitate crime, particularly in regard to the laundering of illicit profits," said Rob Wainwright, director at Europol, at a nuclear security conference in The Hague, Netherlands. Europol doesn't have their own policing powers, but they say that....
Abuse expands with use in the case of cryptocurrency, Europol has acknowledged while also noting that blockchain technologies offer authorities a new opportunity to fight crime. Europe’s law enforcement agency also says they can help investigate money laundering networks.
Understanding Cryptocurrencies Is Vital to Tackling Organized Crime, Europol Says
The growing use of cryptocurrency across borders and industries comes with increasing abuse, new forms of crime, and money laundering, the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol) has concluded after....
Europol has said in a new report that it believes bitcoin could become the go-to currency for digital criminals in the region. The European Union's top law enforcement agency released its Internet Organised Crime Threat Assessment for 2015 on 30th September, outlining its view of the top cybercrime threats facing the European Union. The report focuses on the topic of bitcoin and digital currencies in a number of contexts, including the state of criminal financing and specific elements of illicit activity involving the technology. Europol said that, according to its data, bitcoin accounts....