Accounts entered for investors – Newspaper Kommersant No. 15 (7460) dated 01/27/2023
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The supply of nominal accounts for working on crypto exchanges has increased on the darknet. They are inexpensive and are often used by fraudsters to launder funds. However, the current growth, according to experts, is associated, among other things, with the restrictions imposed by crypto exchanges against Russians. At the same time, many risks remain in the mechanism, including access to the account of the original holder.
According to experts interviewed by Kommersant, the number of offers of registered accounts on crypto exchanges has increased on the dark web. The number of proposals has doubled compared to the beginning of 2022, says Nikolay Chursin, an employee of the Positive Technologies information security threat analysis group. According to Digital Footprint Intelligence analyst Petr Mareichev, the number of new announcements for the sale of ready-made and verified wallets on various crypto exchanges reached 400 in December last year.
Earlier, experts noted that the number of proposals for drawing documents for passing the “know your customer” (KYC) procedure at financial institutions has significantly increased on the darknet (see “Kommersant” dated December 27, 2022).
On average, the cost of account credentials (login and password) is $50, Mr. Chursin notes. “For credentials with a QR code for two-factor authentication, a full package of documents for which the account was registered, mail and Cookie (data that is stored on the computer of the account owner, by which the site recognizes him.— “b”), the buyer will pay an average of $300,” he said.
Dmitry Bogachev, an expert in the external digital threat analysis group at Jet Infosystems, explained that the price depends on several factors: the country of registration, the date of registration (the older the account, the higher the price) and the history of activity. As a rule, the starter package contains account login data, backup means of obtaining access, online telephony details for receiving SMS, and a face value passport, Andrey Kutyin, CEO of Match Systems, added.
The demand is largely due to the fact that in recent months, many crypto exchanges have blocked Russian accounts or do not allow withdrawing money to the cards of Russian banks, said Igor Sergienko, Director for the Development of Special Services at RTK-Solar. At the same time, there are two categories of buyers, says Sergey Mendeleev, head of InDeFi Smart Bank, — Russians who are faced with blocking and are forced to buy an account for everyday work, as well as those who “need such services for criminal cases.” Roman Kaufman, co-founder of BerezkaDAO and Weezi, noted that with the increase in hacking of exchanges, protocols and bridges, centralized exchanges are “an excellent vehicle for laundering any dirty assets.”
From the point of view of Russian legislation, it is difficult to talk about liability for such actions, lawyers say. Within the scope of Art. 174 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Legalization (laundering) of funds or other property acquired by other persons by criminal means”) is theoretically possible, but with a very large number of reservations and related actions (for example, withdrawal from a crypto exchange to a bank account), explains the lawyer of the Baltic Bar Association named after Anatoly Sobchak Elena Mende.
The very fact of buying someone else’s account does not form a violation or crime, since it is not property, unlike cryptocurrency, says Dmitry Zharsky, director of the Veta expert group. At the same time, according to him, according to current laws, cryptocurrency is recognized as property, respectively, when making transactions with such property, it is necessary to pay personal income tax. “If we proceed from the fact that the account is acquired in order to evade the beneficiary from declaring cryptocurrency assets and paying tax when making a transaction with it, then liability may arise precisely for violation of the requirements of tax legislation,” the lawyer specified.
However, for law-abiding Russians, buying such accounts remains a lot of risk, experts warn. For example, there is always a risk of being without funds in an instant, “if suddenly a smart drop (dummy man.— “b”) will suddenly turn to the stock exchange and say that his account has been stolen,” notes Sergey Mendeleev. The sale of accounts, like any shadow market, does not guarantee the protection of the buyer – therefore, in the “fully bred” segment, said Alexander Peresichan, founder of Technobit and Satoshi Spirit. No one, he stressed, can guarantee that after payment the buyer will receive at least something.
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