The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) released its long-awaited guidance on virtual assets, laying out standards that have the potential to reshape the crypto industry in the United States and around the world. The guidance addresses one of the most important challenges for the crypto industry: To convince regulators, legislators and the public that it does not facilitate money laundering. The guidance is particularly concerned with the parts of the crypto industry that have recently brought about significant regulatory uncertainty including decentralized finance (DeFi), stablecoins and nonfungible tokens (NFTs). The guidance largely follows the emerging approach of U.S. regulators toward …

China’s crackdown on crypto is expanding into the metaverse and nonfungible tokens (NFTs), an executive at the People’s Bank of China (PBoC) recently implied. Speaking at a national financial security summit, Gou Wenjun, the director of the Anti-Money Laundering (AML) unit at the PBoC, pointed to the risks associated with leaving the new trends of the crypto ecosystem like NFTs and metaverse unregulated. He claimed that, while people would use said virtual assets for privacy and wealth appreciation, they are also prone to be used for illicit purposes like money laundering and tax evasion. The fast-paced innovation of the crypto …

Israel has reportedly enacted new regulations related to the cryptocurrency industry in order to combat illegal activities like money laundering and terrorism financing. The government of Israel enforced new Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations on Sunday, requiring local fintech companies and virtual currency service providers (VASPs) to obtain an operating license, local news agency Globes reported. The Israel Securities Authority, the Capital Markets, Insurance and Savings Authority, the country’s independent financial regulator, is now reportedly in the process of reviewing various VASPs that have applied for such a license. Shlomit Wegman, director of the Israel Money Laundering and Terror Financing Prohibition …

Identity verification tech firm Civic Technologies has launched a free tool to combat botting activity in Solana (SOL)-based NFT drops. According to a Nov. 8 announcement, Civic’s new tool “Ignite Pass” will filter out bots by requiring buyers to complete a liveness verification before being approved to make NFT purchases. Civic’s website notes that users will be required to take a video selfie in order to verify, with an Ignite Pass then being issued to their wallet address upon completion. The pass also remains active for 24 hours to “limit the options of malicious botters verifying multiple wallets. ” The …

The Securities and Exchange Commission could be emerging victorious in the race to secure the leading role in regulating stablecoins. Additional clarity on the demarcation of regulatory mandates between the SEC, Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Treasury Department could come from the President’s Working Group for Financial Markets’ (PWG) report that was expected by the end of October but failed to arrive before the end of last week. The mandate to regulate cryptocurrency in the United States remains dispersed across a host of actors, and a single PWG report will not remedy this once and for all. Still, having …

Cryptocurrency exchanges Bitfinex is preparing to test out a new Anti-Money Laundering (AML) tool on its platform. The firm announced Wednesday that it will be testing a new solution designed for complying with the “Travel Rule,” an AML/Counter Financing of Terrorism regulation for financial institutions introduced by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in 2019. Bitfinex partnered with compliance startup Notabene to implement its software-as-a-service solution to identify virtual asset accounts, track cross-border transactions and comply with other broad obligations of Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs). The integration will supposedly allow the firm to ensure privacy while collecting and managing …

The central bank of Spain is introducing new registration guidelines for local virtual currency service providers, or VASPs, including banking institutions. The Bank of Spain has issued instructions on VASP registration for Anti-Money Laundering, or AML, purposes, requiring institutions to submit their registration requests through an electronic registry, Cointelegraph en Español reported Oct. 25. Issuing the guidelines on Oct. 19, the Spanish central bank noted that the obligation to sign up in the registry applies to “all individuals and institutions providing virtual currency exchange services” like cryptocurrency trading and custody services. The regulator stressed that VASPs will have to register …

In her monthly Expert Take column, Selva Ozelli, an international tax attorney and CPA, covers the intersection between emerging technologies and sustainability, and provides the latest developments around taxes, AML/CFT regulations and legal issues affecting crypto and blockchain. Lately, news headlines are focused on regulators’ concerns over the lack of investor protections in the cryptocurrency market, which has ballooned to more than $2 trillion, and the possible risks to financial stability. National security agencies across the administration of United States President Joe Biden are grappling with high-profile cases of cryptocurrencies playing a role in ransomware attacks, intellectual property espionage, sanctions …

With an increasing number of people forced to work from their homes, data suggests that ransomware attacks are at their all-time highest with the frequency of these incidents increasing by 45% over the course of April 2021 alone. Not only that, some are adamant that the rise in ransomware attacks is closely connected to the meteoric growth of the crypto sector. Also, in the midst of the recent positive crypto market activity, news of the United States regulators aggressively studying the link between crypto and ransomware seems to be dampening the mood somewhat, especially since various government agencies are seemingly …

Cryptocurrency risk management firm Elliptic has announced a $60 million Series C funding round led by Evolution Equity Partners and supported by a panoply of venture capital firms including SoftBank Vision Fund 2, as well as existing investors AlbionVC, Digital Currency Group, Wells Fargo Strategic Capital and SBI Group, amongst others. Elliptic's history of funding charts a consistent increase, with their debut funding raise in 2016 totaling $5 million, while their second raise across late 2019 to early 2020 resulted in an additional $28 million. Founded in 2013 and headquartered in London, Elliptic captures analytical data from the blockchain sector …

BitOasis, a cryptocurrency exchange from the United Arab Emirates, has partnered with the Dubai Police Force to raise awareness about frauds related to crypto investment and trades. The exchange’s partnership with the Dubai Police is intended to help build regulations that will make crypto safe for investors in the region, BitOasis CEO Ola Doudin said. Speaking to Cointelegraph, Doudin stated: “The BitOasis team has been working very closely with policymakers and regulators to build trust and transparency into the crypto ecosystem. Partnering with Dubai Police is also a move in the same direction.” The move to safeguard investors coincides with …

Brazilian lawmakers are working to provide stricter regulations for cryptocurrency-related crimes, approving a set of new penalties for laundering money with crypto. Brazil’s Special Committee of the Chamber of Deputies has approved a bill that significantly tightens penalties for financial crimes that employ cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), according to an official announcement on Wednesday. The latest regulatory amendments are part of bill 2303/15, increasing the size of the fines from one-third of the amount of laundered money to two-thirds. The bill also proposes to raise minimum prison terms from three to four years, and increase maximum prison time from 10 …