Secret Service Owns Crypto, Loves Blockchain
By Laxmikant Khanvilkar
The United States Secret Service owns crypto, has its own NFT collection and has praised blockchain technology’s ability to fight financial crime, Reddit users learned during a recent ask-me-anything (AMA).
On May 15, representatives from the United States Secret Service San Francisco Field Office and the Bay Area Regional Enforcement Allied Computer Team (REACT) opened themselves to questioning from members of the subreddit, r/cryptocurrency.
The Secret Service has previously made the point that the immutable nature of the blockchain ledger means that illicit financial activity can be more easily monitored and tracked than fiat in some cases.
The Secret Service is the world’s most elite protection force and is at the cutting edge of investigating complex, cyber-enabled financial crime.
An upcoming Netflix-featured Bitfinex story involving some unlikely criminals made this point very clear: it’s quite hard to launder money using blockchain.
The agency said that by owning crypto, it helps them better understand the deeper mechanisms of the crypto world.
When asked if they see any significant differences between crypto crimes and illicit activity in the world of traditional finance, the Secret Service noted that the “vast majority” of calls and reports received by their office usually involves crypto in some fashion.
While the agencies responded to a wide range of serious questions, there was also some fun to be had during the session. When one redditor asked whether the Secret Service would consider launching its own “memecoin”, the agency responded by plugging its own NFT collection on OpenSea.
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