FBI hosts annual Virtual Asset Technical Exchange on crypto crime

The FBI just wrapped its ninth annual Virtual Asset Technical Exchange, a two-day conference in New Orleans where federal agents, law enforcement officials, and blockchain security researchers compared notes on how criminals are exploiting digital assets. The August 27-28 event, co-hosted with the National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force, zeroed in on two of crypto’s ugliest use cases: human trafficking and investment fraud. Inside the conference One of the more notable presentations came from BlockSec, a Chinese blockchain security firm and the only international company at the event. Co-founder Professor Yajin Zhou delivered a keynote on what the industry calls “guarantee platforms,” essentially escrow services that use Tether’s USDT stablecoin to facilitate human trafficking tied to scam operations across Southeast Asia. The research Zhou presented tracked roughly $1.9 million in transaction volumes flowing through these guarantee platforms over a six-month period. Operators of these services collected fees ranging from 10% to 15% per victim. The presence of a Chinese firm at an FBI-hosted event is itself worth noting. Crypto crime is inherently cross-border, and the guaran...