They are not to sanction crypto, it is one of the Russian Exchange SUEX, who are being used by crypto scammers, including all illegal activities (darkweb, ransomware etc). There is one problem though, it is based on Russia, so not sure if US treasury can shut it down.

As far as criminals in online world, even before the existence of crypto, there have been a lot. Do you guys still remember this? Nigerian Price Scam.

OP your link are broken, you can change with this one https://www.uktimenews.com/us-treasury-department-sanctions-crypto-broker-otc-suex-for-alleged-role-in-facilitating-transactions-for-ransomware-attacks/ and you're wrong, the sanction is for Suex OTC not the Bitcoin or crypto usage.


The question is why US departement going to far? Suex OTC is on Czech and Russian, not US... so they should faced a law on their own countries if these countries has a rule of Money Laundering. Chainalysis categorized Ransomware, Scams, High risk exchanges, Darknet market and Mixers are high risk sources, I agree with all category except mixers. Though mixers could be used for Money laundering but not all coins mixed is illegal, it should be grey area.

You have a point but until they could tackle the origin, all they'll be doing is catching their shadows; in other words, they're always one step behind ^{[regardless of the imposed sanctions]}!

Exactly, I wonder why Chainalysis used that word in their blog post?!

From their own words:

• Quote from: https://cointelegraph.com/news/us-treasury-dept-sanctions-crypto-otc-broker-suex-for-alleged-role-in-facilitating-transactions-for-ransomware-attacks
  "exchanges like Suex are critical to attackers' ability to extract profits from ransomware attackers," seemingly targeting cryptocurrency. He added that the sanctions were an attempt to “disrupt the illicit infrastructure using these attacks."

What I think might be the main reason:

• Quote from: https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/ofac-sanction-suex-september-2021
  Suex is also found to have received over $50 million worth of Bitcoin sent from addresses hosted at illicit cryptocurrency exchange BTC-e from 2018 through 2021, well after BTC-e was shut down by U.S. authorities for its own money laundering activity on behalf of cybercriminals.

---

Unfortunately, they're not the only ones with that type of attitude towards mixers ^{[e.g. AMLBot, Antinalysis and etc...]}.

Bitcoin and cryptocurrency have always been highlighting if the case happens any ransomware via Bitcoin. But an everyday lot of crime happening in the world with fiat money. But it hasn't been highlighting at all. Most probably we are crypto users and that's why this kind of news pops up in front of us. But I am pretty sure a group of people doesn't like Bitcoin and they target Bitcoin to dump. I don't believe ransomware will stop even we stop using Bitcoin. Criminals will choose something else to do it. Blaming Bitcoin for ransomware is just nonsense. It wouldn't hurt Bitcoin.

I think there was a misinterpretation made by OP. It was not bitcoin who will be given sanction by the US Treasury Department but its for the Czech and Russian Suex OTC for alledgely allowing hackers to gain access to crypto sent as payment for ransomware attacks. Bitcoin is not really their target. Its really disappointing in my case if they will blame bitcoin when in the fact, bitcoin has nothing to do with it.

No, they can't stop the hackers to keep going with ransomware. Even if they ban bitcoin and et. al, these hackers will still attack those vulnerable people and then no one will stop them from asking crypto from their victims. They should track down these hackers.
What a brilliant idea, giving sanction to crypto and banning bitcoin, who are they against with? nobody can stop the usage of these and they should stop the hackers instead.

To be honest it's much easier tracking these attackers down and apprehending them than banning cryptocurrencies in general. Just another way for the government to mask its ulterior motives of protecting fiat's standing in the economy. Although just like the other moves they did in the past, this will also be in vain. The amount of people who know what bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are capable of is nothing to laugh about, the government should be aware of that. True. What they are trying to do is barking at the wrong tree basically. Thinking that it's bitcoin that's causing the ransomware and hacking attacks when it's can never be closer to the truth. Feasibility researches should be made before proposing bills like this because it's just stupid to think to hear that the people we entrusted our taxes with think like this.

There are many way to do money laundering. Even if those hackers use worthless new coin but they agree with the value of it then it is works. Law enforcement should focus on the hackers. I think even if bitcoin is not exist those hackers will still have desire to hack to get money. The problem is the human not bitcoin. I am pretty surprised that some people has that way of thinking.