US finance ministry imposes sanctions against crypto mixer due to alleged money laundering

The United States has imposed sanctions against a crypto "mixed service", which has supposedly washed more than $ 7 billion in the past three years and helped North Korean state hackers to avoid US punishments.

The Ministry of Finance announced on Monday that Tornado Cash has been used regularly by malicious cyber actors since its foundation in 2019.

The supposedly washed sum comprises $ 455 million, which was captured by the state-funded North Korean hacker group Lazarus Group in March, as well as $ 96 million from Harmony Horizon Bridge in June.

The name by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) marks the latest attempt by US supervisory authorities to act against the circumvention of sanctions with cryptocurrencies.

The authorities pay great attention to so -called mixers because they are disguising the trail of transfers that are usually open to the digital main books on which cryptocurrencies are based.

In May, OFAC imposed sanctions against Blender.io, another crypto mixing service, because of his role in supporting Lazarus in washing over $ 20 million of "illegal revenue".

tornado cash was also used to move at least another $ 7.8 million from the hack of the Nomad exchange last week, said OFAC. Lazarus was sanctioned in the USA in 2019.

"This campaign shows that the United States will be against the fight against the illegal crypto activities of North Korea and actors in the crypto room that make it easier to circumvent North Korean sanctions," said David Carlisle, Vice President for Regulatory Affairs at the Blockchain analysis company Elliptic.

"Despite the efforts of the criminals to disguise their activities, the United States has managed to put one of the most productive supporters of cybercrime on the black list, which tries to pay out their funds," he added.

tornado cash did not react immediately to a request for comment.

At the beginning of this year tornado cash tweeted that it used a tool from the blockchain analysis company Chainalysis to prevent access to access the platform.

A high -ranking official of the Ministry of Finance said on Monday that the name was a broader signal about the dangers that are connected to companies like Tornado Cash.

"We believe that this campaign will send a really critical message to the private sector about the risks that are connected to large -written mixers," said the official of the Ministry of Finance, adding that it was "designed to continue to prevent Tornado Cash or any kind of reconstituted versions from it".

"Today's action is the second Ministry of Finance against a mixer, but it won't be our last," said the official.

officials refused to say where, in his opinion, Tornado Cash was based or whether his operations were connected to foreign governments.

The naming is also carried out in the course of a implementation regulation signed by President Joe Biden at the beginning of this year, which increased the ability of the US government against using digital assets in illegal financing.

In February, the Ministry of Finance published a national money laundering risk assessment, which described the use of "technologies to improve anonymity" as Mixer as a "growing trend".