South Korea sees rise in crypto crimes, $2.28B in costs

The latest data from the South Korean government indicates that crimes involving cryptocurrency have been on the rise and has cost 2.69 trillion won ($2.28 billion) since 2017. This has led the Justice Ministry to take a more aggressive stance towards perpetrators.

According to a report by The Korea Herald, crypto crimes in the country have gone up within a two-year period. This is based on the data provided by the Justice Ministry, with the relevant period of time being between July 2017 and June 2019.

During this time, 132 criminals that have committed crimes involving cryptocurrency have been detained after being indicted. 288 have been indicted but are not currently in the physical custody of the law.

South Korea’s appetite for crypto trading has been significantly reduced since 2017, but the data shows that the rates at which crypto crimes are being committed have not. The situation has become so alarming, Justice Minister Park Sang-ki has issued orders for more aggressive measures to be taken against crypto criminals.

The main focus of the ministry now is to regain the funds that were lost due to these crimes and to reduce the rate at which they are committed. The rising crimes rate itself is aided by so-called “beehive accounts” where crypto exchanges use corporate bank accounts to manage customer funds. This then grants the users anonymity.

Unfortunately, the absence of clear regulations in South Korea appears to hamper not only the pursuit of justice involving crypto crimes but also in allowing legal trading to thrive, Cointelegraph points out. Taking “beehive accounts” as an example, this was the result of the government banning anonymous crypto accounts in January 2018.

The Justice Ministry already tried to have “beehive accounts” shut down but a court decision put a pause on that. It was concluded that doing so would also close corporate bank accounts and this was deemed inappropriate on the part of the ministry.