South Korean police continue to wage “battle” on crypto-powered drug trafficking, with officers in the capital Seoul making 452 arrests from June 2022 to December 2023.
Per the media outlet Money At present time, police arrested three suspected drug sellers. Officers also charged 445 merchants and 4 illegal “cryptoasset shopping and selling platform operators.”
South Korean Police in Uphill Fight Against Crypto-powered Drug Crime?
Police launched files showing that their investigations date aid from 2018 to the quit of 2023.
The nation is struggling with what politicians relish called an “epidemic” of childhood crypto-powered drug shopping and selling.
Officers mentioned that 90% of the folk they arrested were used between 20 and 39, with five teenagers also charged.
Police groups around the nation relish made crypto-powered drug trafficking-linked arrests in the previous.
Nevertheless this marks the first time officers relish succeeded in shutting down a suspected illegal crypto replace flee by narcotics-linked gangs.
A police spokesperson mentioned that 146 of the suspects had prior criminal data. The spokesperson added that most (60%) of the deals eager marijuana.
Over 23% of the trades eager methamphetamine (also identified as crystal meth). Other deals eager treatment esteem ecstasy (MDMA), synthetic marijuana, and ketamine.
The teenage suspects reportedly told police that they were in a situation to rep sellers via social media publicizes and internet posts.
Cryptonews.com used to be in a situation to ogle ratings of what looked as if it could perchance well be Korean-language adverts for drug sellers who claimed so that you just can “ship” narcotics “nationwide” on X (Twitter) and Telegram channels.
Police launched photos of some of the objects they’d seized at some stage in their raids.
Narcotics seized by the Seoul Metropolitan Police Company. (Source: Seoul Metropolitan Police Company)Crypto Monitoring Tools Helped Us Fetch Criminals, Direct Police
Nam Sung-shin, the head of the First Drug Crime Investigation Division on the Seoul Metropolitan Police Company, briefed journalists on the arrests on February 28.
Nam explained that officers faded crypto and blockchain monitoring tools to establish suspects.
The division chief mentioned tracing the “cryptoassets sent to the sellers’ pockets addresses” had paid dividends.
The exercise of these methodology enabled officers to phrase down suspects and “arrest them in huge numbers.” Nam mentioned:
“Many other folks relate that if they exercise the dark internet or obvious chat apps or social media platforms, their anonymity will almost definitely be guaranteed. They relate cops will no longer be in a situation to phrase them. On the opposite hand, investigative personnel with intensive investigative skills are consistently looking for drug offenders.”
South Korean police mentioned they’d charged the four suspected “operators of the virtual asset shopping and selling company” with violations of the Explicit Financial Info Act.
The act requires all crypto exchanges and pockets operators to fetch working licenses from the regulatory Financial Intelligence Unit.
To this level, finest five domestic crypto exchanges, all segment of an association that calls itself DAXA, relish acquired the crucial permits required to permit KRW-crypto shopping and selling.
South Korean firms that relish no longer viewed mumble in a truly prolonged time likelihood being dropped from the stock replace, the nation’s financial watchdog says https://t.co/sIea8ELh2S
— Bloomberg (@trade) February 28, 2024
The same exchanges closing 365 days joined forces with regulators in a sing to crack down on “unlicensed” and “unregistered” crypto shopping and selling platforms.
Police in the metropolis of Daegu mentioned in November 2023 that they’d raided a “drug trafficking group” that faded crypto as a payment utility. Officers mentioned they arrested 48 other folks in the raids.
The metropolis’s police company metropolitan investigation unit mentioned 44 of the team were connected to a suspected “in a foreign places nation narcotics sales group.”
