Bitcoin and privacy-focused cryptocurrencies are the most popular among criminals, said Valery Baulin, head of the computer forensics laboratory at Group-IB, in an interview with RIA Novosti.
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In addition to Bitcoin, criminals frequently use Monero, Zcash, Dash, and Komodo to cash out.
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Assessing the share of crime attributable to cryptocurrencies is difficult, but their number is likely to grow, Baulin added:
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“As more and more people invest in crypto as a speculative instrument, the amount of crime will grow again.”
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He emphasised that this is driven by users’ neglect of security, despite high-profile hacks of exchanges and wallets.
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Baulin also believes that the number of cybercrimes will rise overall, and companies must ‘seriously consider strengthening proactive cyber-defence of their IT infrastructure, preventing attacks at the preparation stage, and raising employees’ cyber literacy’.
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As Atlas VPN notes, in 2020, in 122 attacks on blockchain industry representatives, hackers stole nearly $3.8 billion in cryptocurrencies.
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Read about the year’s most high-profile hacks in ForkLog’s exclusive.
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