U.S. lawmakers have introduced a bill that empowers the Secret Service to investigative unlicensed money transmitting businesses involved in digital assets like cryptocurrency.
The reintroduced Combatting Money Laundering in Cyber Crime Act would update current laws to authorize the Secret Service to investigate all new forms of criminal activity involving digital assets.
Specifically, the bill would authorize the Secret Service to investigate the operations of unlicensed money transmitting businesses — entities that provide money transfer services or payment instruments — and the structuring of financial transactions to evade reporting and recordkeeping requirements.
“As money laundering schemes continue to evolve, so must our capacity to combat them,” said Senator Grassley. “By enhancing Secret Service’s authority to investigate criminal digital assets, our bill significantly improves law enforcement’s ability to effectively anticipate, identify and prevent cybercrime.”
The issue has been spotlighted in recent weeks as U.S. law enforcement agencies have tried, and largely failed, at stopping North Korean hackers from laundering more than $1 billion stolen from crypto platform Bybit.