Rising Tide of Illicit Funds: $4 Billion Washed Through Cross-Chain Crypto

Criminals in the cryptocurrency world use blockchain technology as one of the main means to launder money since it allows them to send digital assets across blockchain networks without being traceable or frozen by a centralized service.

They do this with the help of so-called cross-chain bridges, and the dollar amount involved is getting larger and larger every year. 

Elliptic, a blockchain analytics firm specializing in blockchain monitoring and analysis, has conducted a comprehensive analysis of a few cross-chain bridges, including RenBridge, to determine how much bitcoin has been laundered each year since 2020, according to new research. 

There are several types of cross-chain crime, but the most obvious one is the swapping of crypto assets between different tokens or blockchains without any legitimate purpose – often in quick succession and frequently for the sole purpose of concealing their criminal origins. 

There is a growing trend, popularly referred to as “chain-hopping” or “asset-hopping”, to launder crypto assets across different chains to minimize the risk of theft or loss.

This was revealed in a recent report published by blockchain industry surveillance firm Elliptic, which found that $7 billion of “illicit or high-risk funds” have been laundered using decentralized exchanges (DEXs), cross-chain bridges, and non-KYC exchanges that do not require customer identification.&nb

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