The Executive Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, on Tuesday, said the commission recovered about $20 million worth of cryptocurrency loot from cybercriminals, adding that the loot has been saved in the commission’s e-wallet.
This is as the anti-graft agency has said that it sees cryptocurrency as an avenue where these fraudsters launder the proceeds of crime.
This disclosure was made by Bawa while speaking at a Channels Television programme, ‘Sunrise Daily’ on Tuesday, June 15, 2021.
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What the EFCC Chairman is saying
The EFCC boss expressed his support for the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s ban on cryptocurrency transactions, saying that it has helped to limit the avenues through which these criminals launder their proceeds of crimes in the country.
Bawa said, “As it is today, there is nowhere in the world where cryptocurrency is being regulated. The EFCC is looking at an avenue in which people are laundering and receiving proceeds of crime and that is our worry.
We have seen time and time again where cybercriminals are using this avenue to get their proceeds of crime. Before it used to be through money transfer agencies like Money Gram and of cause Western Union. Now they have gone E. They will defraud somebody. They will get gift cards, exchange them on the dark web, and they will use the proceeds to buy crypto, and they can get it to their e-wallet, and then, of course, they can sell and get their money.
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As it is today, we have about 20 million dollars worth of cryptocurrency as of last statistics that I have because we also created our own e-wallet to recover cryptocurrency, you know it has never happened before but we created it. We are now recovering these proceeds of crime from that means as well.
So, we are in support of what the CBN has done because it has limited the ways in which some of these criminals can exchange their crypto and get naira for it.”
Details later…
Banning banks from transacting in crypto does not and can not stop or eradicates the activities of these fraudsters instead it has brought obstacles on the way of legitimate business what the central bank needs to do is making sure all e-wallets owners must undergo a proper verification process and can be traced