As the crypto space sees a spike in the number of exploits and hacks, Interpol, the organization that facilitates international police cooperation and crime busting, has set up a special team to tackle the alarming issue. This Singapore-based team will help governments around the world fight crimes involving virtual assets, according to an announcement by Interpol Secretary General Jürgen Stock on 17 October.
Stock made the announcement at a press conference ahead of the 90th General Assembly of Interpol in New Delhi. The three-day assembly, which represents the international policing organization’s top governing body, was last held in India in 1997. The Assembly started on 18 October this year.
The Interpol Secretary General also announced that crypto and cybercrime will be one of the central issues on the agenda during the Assembly. In his view, Bitcoin and Ethereum pose challenges to law enforcement agencies in the absence of a legal framework.
Most countries are not “properly trained and properly equipped” to address many crypto crimes, Stock lamented. Praveen Sinha, the special director of India’s Central Bureau of Investigation, supported Jürgen, recounting the many difficulties involved in monitoring cybercrime.
Both the officials highlighted the Interpol’s role in establishing and developing better police cooperation at the global level.
Unfortunately, the Interpol move coincided with yet another exploit. Crypto wallet BitKeep was hacked of tokens worth over $1 million, on 18 October. The latest exploit is one among a series of hacks this year. Just last week, Mango Markets, a decentralized finance (DeFI) platform, lost over $100 million in an exploit.
While the alarming number of exploits in recent times might have been a factor behind the Interpol move, the organization has been working toward improving its crypto crime tracking abilities since 2015. In fact, in 2020, Interpol partnered with cybersecurity firm Trend Micro to reduce cryptojacking, when one party’s computing resources are hijacked for crypto mining. Cryptojacking had been affecting routers across Southeast Asia at the time.
Most recently, in the aftermath of the Terra situation, Interpol even issued a “red notice” to global law enforcement for the arrest of Terraform Labs co-founder Do Kwon.
