Only 1% of bitcoin transactions involve crime – CipherTrace

Blockchain analysts CipherTrace found that only one percent of all bitcoin blockchain transactions involve illegal activity

Bitcoin is not as popular among criminal entities as it may seem. At least that’s the conclusion reached by CipherTrace. In their monthly report, the analysts stated that only 1% of all Bitcoin blockchain transactions can be considered high-risk.

For example, analysts found that in 2020, about 1.2% of bitcoin blockchain transactions are made between cryptocurrency exchanges and high-risk organizations. Meanwhile, about 6% of transactions are between the exchanges themselves. Another 32% of transactions are between cryptocurrency exchanges and private wallets, and 61% of transactions are between private wallets.

In their sample, CipherTrace categorized high-risk organizations as:

• gambling sites;
• mixers;
• darknet;
• HYIP scam campaigns;
• ransomware;
• malware;
• criminals;
• darknet provider;
• high-risk exchanges.

Moreover, the analysts also decided to find out the volume of risky transactions used to launder money. They concluded that the share of such transactions fell from more than 1% to 0.11% in 2020.

However, the activity of fraudsters in the cryptocurrency market has not died down. As Elliptic analysts previously found out, at least 13% of all criminal proceeds in bitcoin in 2020 went through anonymous wallets. By comparison, this figure did not exceed 2% in 2019. That said, Elliptic admits that, in absolute terms, the amount of criminal transactions in recent years is less than 1% of all transactions on the network. This is 34% less than in 2012.