The U.S. Department of the Treasury has stepped up its enforcement actions as part of an international effort to halt Russian cybercriminals’ money laundering.
The Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has issued an order targeting PM2BTC, a Russian money laundering platform. The currency exchange has been operating with Sergey Sergeevich Ivanov, a person of interest for national security agents.
At the same time, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is sanctioning Ivanov and Cryptex, a virtual currency exchange registered in St. Vincent and the Grenadines with a base of operations in Russia.
Key player in Russian money laundering is a target for the Treasury
FinCEN and OFAC are deploying their actions in tandem with other international regulatory bodies that regulate cryptocurrency and money laundering. U.S. special agents and government watchdogs are also involved in the hunt to shut down Ivanov’s actions.
The Treasury is hot on the heels of Ivanov, who they say is an “alleged Russian money launderer, who has laundered hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of virtual currency for ransomware actors, initial access brokers, darknet marketplace vendors, and other criminal actors for approximately the last 20 years.”
PM2BTC and Cryptex are also at the centre of the sanctions, which the Treasury hopes will stem their million-dollar money laundering. The FinCEN investigation found that “half of PM2BTC’s exchange activity had links to illicit activity, and correspondingly, that PM2BTC facilitates a substantially greater proportion of transactions with apparent links to money laundering activity in connection with Russian illicit finance as compared to 99 percent of other virtual asset service providers.”
“The United States and our international partners remain resolute in our commitment to prevent cybercrime facilitators like PM2BTC and Cryptex from operating with impunity,” said Acting Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Bradley T. Smith. “Treasury, in close coordination with our allies and partners, will continue to use all tools and authorities to disrupt the networks that seek to leverage the virtual assets ecosystem to facilitate their illicit activities.”
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