In contrast to the previous years from 2018 to 2021, where Bitcoin was the preferred choice for illicit transactions, stablecoins have taken the lead by a significant margin in 2022 and 2023. This shift has resulted in a decline in the use of Bitcoin for illegal activities in 2021.
This rise in popularity of stablecoins among cybercriminals aligns with the overall increase in the usage of these crypto assets. Currently, stablecoins account for approximately 60% of illicit transactions, while around 10% of transactions are conducted in ETH, and approximately 24% in BTC.
Stablecoins have increasingly become the go-to choice in jurisdictions subject to economic sanctions. The total value of illegal cryptocurrency transactions in the past year is estimated to be around $24.2 billion. Furthermore, in 2023, hackers’ profits from breaching crypto projects decreased by 54.3%, and fraudsters’ profits saw a decline of 29.2%.
Prior to this, Chainalysis had reported that the revenue generated from cryptocurrency phishing activities between May 2021 and December 2023 exceeded $1 billion.