Bestmixer Seized by Police for Washing $200 Million in Tainted Cryptocurrency Clean:
Bestmixer.io has been seized and shut down by European police for reportedly laundering over $200 million in cryptocurrency.
On Wednesday, Europol, the Dutch Fiscal Information and Investigation Service (FIOD), and Luxembourg authorities said six servers used to facilitate the service were seized in the Netherlands and Luxembourg.
Bestmixer launched in May 2018. Only a month later, police began investigating the mixing service and found that over the course of one year, the "world's leading cryptocurrency mixing service" had managed to launder at least $200 million in cryptocurrency on behalf of customers.
[...] The service was able to mix Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Litecoin (LTC). By "mixing" these tainted coins with others, it is possible to clean up funds and eradicate ties to criminal activities written in the blockchain ledger in a process also known as "washing."
[...] A commission is then taken from the original sum before the funds are diverted to another output address, free of ledger entries which may criminalize the owners.
McAfee assisted in the investigation and has published a blog post about it.
Also at: Security Week
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday May 27 2019, @05:40AM (4 children)
The legitimate use would be to allow private transactions.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @05:55AM
That has to be banned, because some people will do Bad Things if we allow privacy. And, as we all know, everyone's ability to have privacy should be taken away when it's most convenient for the government.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Monday May 27 2019, @06:33AM (1 child)
Disagree. You're not transacting privately with other people - you're washing your dirty Bitcoins and giving them back to yourself.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday May 27 2019, @06:02PM
there's no such thing as a dirty bitcoin. only people who may have broken the law who have bitcoins.
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Monday May 27 2019, @10:07AM
Yes, didn't Dash have something like this as a built-in feature?