TOPLINE
The U.S. government has seized 300 cryptocurrency accounts allegedly used by terrorist organizations like Al Qaeda, Hamas and the Islamic State (ISIS), with millions of dollars of digital currency in what the Department of Justice said was the “largest ever seizure of terrorist organizations’ cryptocurrency accounts,” in a press release on Thursday.
The DOJ said that terror agencies were using cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin to fund their activities.
KEY FACTS
The Justice Department said that its actions have led to the dismantling of three terrorist financing cyber-enabled campaigns that used social media to obtain cryptocurrency for carrying out terrorist attacks.
Court documents filed by the DOJ on Thursday show that the agency has seized bitcoin from 155 accounts allegedly being used by Al Qaeda.
The FBI, the IRS’ cyber crimes unit and Homeland Security Investigations allege that Al-Qaeda had created a channel on the messaging app Telegram that was used to solicit bitcoin donations to fund the group’s terror activities.
According to a separate complaint filed in a D.C. federal court, U.S. authorities have sought an arrest warrant for two individuals, Mehmet Akti and Hüsamettı̇n Karataş, who allegedly stored and transferred cryptocurrencies to Hamas’ military wing, the al-Qassam Brigade.
Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis company that aided the investigators, wrote in a blog post that authorities have seized over $1 million worth of cryptocurrencies from the terror organizations.
Crucial Quote
"Terrorist networks have adapted to technology, conducting complex financial transactions in the digital world, including through cryptocurrencies. IRS-CI special agents in the DC cybercrimes unit work diligently to unravel these financial networks," said Secretary of the Treasury Steven T. Mnuchin. "Today's actions demonstrate our ongoing commitment to holding malign actors accountable for their crimes.”
Surprising Fact
The DOJ says its investigation uncovered a scheme by an ISIS facilitator, Murat Cakar, who took advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic to sell fake personal protective equipment via a website called FaceMaskCenter.com. The website claimed to sell FDA-approved N95 respirator masks and also claimed to have near unlimited supplies of the masks, despite a global crunch in supply. U.S. authorities have seized the website as well as four related Facebook pages used to facilitate the scheme.
