In 2008, a mysterious name began to circulate among people - "Satoshi Nakamoto."

This enigmatic figure, whose identity remained unknown, introduced the concept of Bitcoin.

Against the backdrop of the global financial crisis, Bitcoin emerged with skepticism towards the traditional financial system.

It claimed to break the centralized monetary system and use technological means to achieve decentralized digital currency transactions, sounding like a revolution in the financial world.

In the early days, many people dismissed this "currency" that was invisible and intangible, just a string of code, and some even thought it was just a carnival for tech enthusiasts.

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However, as time went on, Bitcoin gradually attracted the attention of investors, and its price soared.

As Bitcoin and the virtual currency family it spurred began to thrive, dangerous signs were quietly growing.

Anonymity and decentralization, which seemed to be technological advantages, allowed some criminals to see opportunities.

Virtual currency became a breeding ground for some criminal activities, especially in online fraud and money laundering, showing strong "functionality."

Virtual currency is not controlled by national monetary policy, and it is extremely difficult to track the identity information of the trading parties, making many criminal activities more covert and complex.

Virtual currency gradually transformed from an investment tool into a "perfect" auxiliary tool for some criminal activities.

Many people are not aware of this and even unknowingly fall into it.

As virtual currency gradually expanded globally, many products similar to Bitcoin also emerged in the market, such as Ethereum, Litecoin, etc.

Trading platforms sprouted like mushrooms after rain, among which the most well-known is the Binance platform founded by Changpeng Zhao.

Changpeng Zhao, an entrepreneur who was originally unknown, quickly became a big man in the field of virtual currency with the success of Binance.

The Binance platform not only provides virtual currency trading services for millions of users worldwide but also provides convenient money laundering methods for many criminals.

In 2023, Changpeng Zhao and his Binance platform were investigated by the U.S. judicial authorities and were accused of a large number of money laundering, tax evasion, and illegal trading activities.

In the end, Changpeng Zhao was restricted from leaving the country and paid a huge fine.

This incident shocked the entire virtual currency market.

Although such incidents have attracted great social attention, the complexity of virtual currency far exceeds the understanding of ordinary people.

The concept of Bitcoin seems technically sophisticated, but in reality, it provides a hidden trading channel for illegal transactions, cross-border money laundering, and other criminal activities.

Through virtual currency, criminals can easily transfer funds from one country to another without any supervision.

Traditional bank transfers require a complex review process, while virtual currency can be achieved by completing a few clicks online, allowing many criminals to thrive in the process of committing crimes.

More and more illegal activities use virtual currency as a medium for money laundering and illegal fundraising, and even for dark web transactions.

Although the negative effects of virtual currency have gradually emerged, not everyone is vigilant about it.

Many individuals involved in virtual currency transactions, especially young people, may not even know that the transactions they are involved in may be helping criminal activities.

They may be participating only out of the expectation of the appreciation of virtual currency or thinking that it is just a new type of investment method.

In fact, the transaction of virtual currency is often much more complex than it appears on the surface.

Due to its anonymity, many people cannot judge who they are trading with, and the source of funds is extremely opaque.

These funds may be related to illegal activities such as fraud, smuggling, and drug trafficking, which also makes the use of virtual currency extremely risky.

In this context, the Chinese government began to completely ban virtual currency transactions in 2021.

The People's Bank of China and ten other departments jointly issued the "Notice on Further Preventing and Dealing with the Risks of Virtual Currency Trading Speculation," which clearly defined virtual currency trading activities as illegal financial activities.

Business related to virtual currency, such as buying and selling, exchange, and consulting, was identified as illegal behavior.

Not only is the civil legal effect invalid, but it may also violate the criminal law, and serious offenders will be held criminally responsible.

This policy indicates that China has realized the threat of virtual currency to the social and economic order and has taken strict regulatory measures.

Even under such strict policies, virtual currency transactions have not completely disappeared.

Some criminals still trade virtual currency through underground channels to evade supervision and continue to use its anonymity for criminal activities.

Although the example of Binance has attracted great attention worldwide, it has not completely stopped the operation of similar platforms.

Some platforms even transfer servers or change rules to continue to walk in the gray area of the law.

In general, virtual currency has gradually evolved from a financial innovation tool at the beginning to a "lawless land" in the eyes of criminals.

Although virtual currency itself is not wrong, its technical characteristics make criminal activities more difficult to track and regulate.

As countries around the world gradually strengthen the supervision of virtual currency, the future of virtual currency will become more uncertain.

The trajectory of the development of virtual currency, especially its use in crime, has attracted the attention of many countries and regions around the world.

As the number of cases of illegal use of virtual currency gradually increases, countries have taken measures to regulate and crack down on the virtual currency market.

China's comprehensive ban on virtual currency transactions in 2021 is just the tip of the iceberg of the global virtual currency supervision storm.

Through China's strict policy, virtual currency transactions have indeed been strongly hit in a short period of time.

Some mainstream trading platforms have closed or transferred their business, and even some investors have begun to withdraw from this high-risk market.

However, just as the salt and iron monopoly in history did not completely eliminate smuggling and black market transactions, the "underground market" for virtual currency still exists.

Although the official platforms have been banned, some private virtual currency trading activities are still active, especially in some illegal online activities, virtual currency still plays the role of a "money laundering tool."

Criminals transfer funds and purchase illegal goods on dark web trading platforms through virtual currency, thus evading supervision and completing their illegal activities.

As the risks of virtual currency transactions are increasingly exposed, countries have begun to take corresponding legal measures to crack down on them.

China's regulatory attitude is particularly strict.

Since 2021, China has adopted a comprehensive ban on virtual currency transactions, which has forced investors and entrepreneurs who were eager to enter the virtual currency market to re-examine their legal environment.

Behind this policy lies the Chinese government's maintenance of social and economic order and its zero-tolerance attitude towards telecommunication fraud, online crimes, and other behaviors.

Traditional financial systems, including banks and payment institutions, have strict regulatory mechanisms.

Whether it is the transfer of large amounts of funds or frequent suspicious transactions, it will attract the attention of regulatory authorities.

However, due to the decentralized nature of virtual currency, it is not controlled by any central bank or financial institution.

Although the transaction information is open and transparent, it cannot be located to specific individuals.

This feature makes it a "perfect tool" for money laundering, illegal fundraising, and other criminal activities.

One of the typical criminal forms is the crime of aiding and abetting information network crimes.

In many telecommunication fraud cases, the funds obtained after the fraud need to be quickly transferred to avoid being frozen or tracked by the banking system.

At this time, criminals will use the anonymity of virtual currency, convert the funds obtained from fraud into Bitcoin or other virtual currencies, and then transfer the funds to different countries or regions through virtual currency trading platforms.

Since there is no actual bank account information in virtual currency transactions, it makes it extremely difficult for the police to track the flow of funds.

In the end, the losses of the victims are difficult to recover, and the fraud gangs can easily evade legal sanctions.

Another high-incidence crime is the crime of concealing and covering up the proceeds of crime.

This crime is closely related to the crime of aiding and abetting information network crimes and often occurs in the same case.

Criminals use virtual currency to launder funds, go through a series of complex transaction chains, and convert and transfer the illegally obtained funds through multiple virtual currency exchanges, and finally withdraw them in a legal form.

In this process, due to the anonymous transaction characteristics of virtual currency, the proceeds of crime on the surface become legal income, resulting in a significant increase in the difficulty of case investigation.

Virtual currency also frequently appears in the crime of opening gambling houses.

The non-contact nature of virtual currency makes it a common payment method for online gambling.

In these cases, criminal gangs use the characteristics of virtual currency to build gambling websites, and gamblers can gamble with virtual currency, and the won virtual currency can also be easily exchanged for legal currency.

Since these gambling platforms are mostly anonymous transactions and the servers are mostly set up overseas, it makes the supervision and crackdown by relevant departments more complex.

The funds between gamblers and platforms are secretive, and virtual currency has become the key link in this huge underground industry chain.

The application of virtual currency in pyramid schemes is also increasing.

Pyramid schemes often use investment as a cover, requiring participants to invest funds, and mainly rely on developing downlines as the profit model.

In recent years, virtual currency has become the "new favorite" of pyramid schemes, and criminal gangs attract a large number of investors to participate through the claim of "high returns, high returns" of virtual currency investment projects.

However, the so-called returns do not actually exist, and the "returns" of the pyramid organization are entirely supported by the funds of downstream investors.

In the end, when the pyramid scheme is exposed, most investors not only fail to obtain returns but also face financial losses, and the leaders of the pyramid organization transfer huge amounts of funds through virtual currency.Although China has adopted a comprehensive crackdown policy on virtual currencies, the regulatory attitudes around the world are not entirely uniform.

For instance, countries like Japan and South Korea have adopted more lenient regulatory policies, allowing the legalization of virtual currency transactions, but at the same time requiring that trading platforms and users must operate under a real-name system.

This disparity leads to different regulatory environments for virtual currencies in different countries, providing criminals with more options.

They can choose to transfer funds in countries with looser regulations to evade crackdowns.

Considering the various application scenarios of virtual currencies, it cannot be ignored that with the promotion of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs), the future of virtual currencies will become even more unpredictable.

CBDCs are issued by sovereign institutions and have some advantages of virtual currencies, but are fully regulated by central authorities, transparent, and traceable.

In contrast, although virtual currencies are technologically advanced, their decentralization and anonymity have gradually made them a focus of legal crackdowns.

In the future, as the regulatory systems of countries around the world continue to improve, whether virtual currencies can continue to survive in the legal market remains an open question.

Public opinion on virtual currencies varies.

Some people believe that the technological advantages of virtual currencies are worth looking forward to and represent a transformation of the future financial system, while others believe that the high risk and uncertainty of virtual currencies doom them to not exist in the long term.

Against the backdrop of tightening policies, how the future development of virtual currencies will affect the entire financial market is still full of unknowns.