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Dutch authorities just shut down a website that offers Bitcoin transaction mixing services, in collaboration with Europol and Luxembourg law enforcement.
The seized website, Bestmixer.io, is said to be one of three largest crypto mixing services in the world with a total turnover of over $200 million since its launch on May last year. Their portfolio included Bitcoin, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash.
Bestmixer worked by pooling funds together and then creating a website of new transactions to obfuscate the original source of the cryptos, as reported by Coindesk.
Their income came from a fee from the users after they successfully receive the funds they sent from a completely new address.
Europol claim to have a criminal origin and destination, quoting their statement, “In these cases, the mixer was probably used to conceal and launder criminal flows of money.
Initiated by the Dutch Fiscal Information and Investigation Service (FIOD), with the help of McAfee cybersecurity company, the investigation started on June last year.
The operation later involved the Europol as well as the Luxembourg law enforcement and successfully seized six servers based in Luxembourg and The Netherlands, along with an extensive amount of information, such as transaction records, IP addresses, chat messages, and Bitcoin addresses, although no arrests have been made so far.
The information obtained from the investigation will be analyzed by Europol and the FIOD first, before sharing them with the authorities in other countries, as Micky.com reported.
Commenting on the news, blockchain expert from Cornell University, Emin Gun Sirer said that it will have major ramifications moving forward, such as the creation of tumblers that can’t be shut down.
“My guess is that the authorities will come to regret the chain reaction that they are starting here,” he closed his statement.
My guess is that the authorities will come to regret the chain reaction that they are starting here.
— Emin Gün Sirer (@el33th4xor) May 23, 2019
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