Israel spreads" blacklist " of Hamas-related Bitcoin addresses
By Viking Wallin
These are addresses that are used by the group to receive donations.
The Palestinian organization receives funds in BTC, but also in USDT, DOGE and ETH.
The Israeli government "seized" more than 80 addresses of bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies from the Palestinian group Hamas. The Office for the Fight against the Financing of Terrorism released a list with information on what type of digital assets the organization receives. These are addresses arranged for contributions from their followers.
Donations with cryptocurrencies were targeted, according to Israel, al-Qassam Brigades (AQB), but they were also sent to other relatives of the group. According to records released by blockchain intelligence firm Chainalysis, fighters receive funds in bitcoin, but also in USDT, DOGE, XRP, BNB and ETH, for example.
"This action comes after a considerable increase in cryptocurrency donations to Hamas in May following increased fighting between the group and Israeli forces. In particular, this is the first cryptocurrency seizure related to terrorism financing that includes such a wide variety of digital assets," Chainalysis explained in its statement.
The state counter-terrorism bureau links the "seized" addresses to seven activists. At the time of publishing this article, in the addresses of Bitcoin there was a overall balance of 0.051 BTC or about $ 1,700, according to the current quote of the first cryptocurrency. As for the rest of the addresses, it should be mentioned that they also register several operations with cryptoassets.
Chainalysis claimed that some addresses are related to exchanges and that activists often move funds to intermediary wallets and to "high-risk"exchange houses. In addition, two of the aforementioned addresses also reportedly received funds from the Syrian exchange Bitcoin Transfer which, according to the intelligence firm, is linked to cases of financing terrorism.
It is important to clarify that, although Chainalysis speaks of "seizure", the most accurate thing is to talk about a marking of the addresses. That is, if any service provider with digital assets received funds from these addresses, then they should report it to the authorities or they could even block cryptocurrencies.
Investigate Bitcoin transactions
The bitcoiner ecosystem has reached several companies that conduct research on how cryptocurrencies move within blockchains. Over the past few years companies such as Chainalysis, Elliptic and CipherTrace have entered into contracts with governments, public or private entities to conduct research on where crypto assets come from and where they are going.
Even some exchanges have also started to hire this type of service, especially to settle regulatory and compliance issues. In the case of Hamas, Crypto News has reported in the past that exchanges have blocked BTC donations to the group.
In April 2019, the group began using new methods to receive funds and bypass the blockage of exchanges. For a time the organization received funds in the following way: to provide specific addresses and receive contributions, a website generated a public key to a new wallet after each donation, according to a Crypto News report.
The mechanism, according to Elliptic researchers, made the detection of funds that were used to finance the group's operations more complicated.
Viking Wallin - July 23, 2021
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