Cybercriminals transited more than $2.8 billion in illegally acquired bitcoins in 2019, participating in a very large wave of money laundering according to the Chainalysis conducted analysis.

This is a very strong increase compared to 2018, (about $1 billion had been laundered on exchanges). Half of these transactions took place on two popular exchanges, Binance and Huobi.

Both platforms have a security policy called Know Your Customer (KYC). It helps to verify the identity of customers and prevent fraud and money laundering by requiring the disclosure of their real identity via your official documents such as a driver’s license or passport that must be verified.

But it is through intermediary accounts that crooks bypass these security measures. These individuals would facilitate exchanges between two parties, making the funds tracking more complex.

Chainalysis presents a list of accounts suspected to participate in these traffics. These accounts are very active and have been moving more and more funds since 2017.

Chainalysis is sounding the alarm and asking exchanges to enforce stricter rules to ending criminal activities.