An investigation finds Binance served as a conduit for laundering $2.35B+ between 2017 and 2021, including funds gathered from hacks, fraud, and drug sales
For five years, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance served as a conduit for the laundering of at least $2.35 billion …
Reuters
Context & Ripple Effects
The laundering allegations followed Binance's 2019 disclosure of a large-scale security breach involving stolen bitcoin and compromised user credentials, placing illicit-flow risks alongside the exchange's own security exposure.
Related coverage later identified a cross-border drug gang's use of Binance to move alleged criminal proceeds, while reports of customer-fund commingling broadened scrutiny from transaction controls to Binance's internal financial handling.
First-order effects
Binance is directly associated with alleged laundering of more than $2.35 billion in proceeds from hacks, fraud, and drug sales over the 2017–2021 period, putting its transaction-monitoring and compliance practices at the center of the investigation.
Second-order effects
The later DEA finding involving a Mexico-based drug gang gives law-enforcement scrutiny of Binance a specific criminal-network dimension rather than leaving it at aggregate transaction allegations.
Reports that Binance commingled customer funds with revenue add a separate governance concern, making the exchange's custody and compliance practices mutually relevant to users and counterparties.
Third-order effects
If allegations spanning hacks, drug proceeds, customer-fund handling, and later sanctioned-country flows continue to accumulate, large crypto exchanges will face a widening legitimacy test that joins financial controls with platform governance.
European police's reported concern that Binance's request-routing policy delays investigations shows how compliance design can become an operational issue for law enforcement, not merely a disclosure issue.
The trend: Binance's coverage reflects the broader crypto legitimacy gap, in which major exchanges are judged increasingly on whether their controls can withstand scrutiny of illicit finance and customer-asset governance.
This is not something new, you know right? It feels like drafted FUD over the weekend just so they can get their shorts from underwater. It costs you 250$ one account. Not only on Binance, but as well on Coinbase and on Revolut. https://www.reuters.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Several hours after North Korean hackers broke into a Slovakian firm and stole $5.4 million in virtual currency, they opened anonymous accounts on the world's largest crypto exchange Binance, enabling them to obscure the money trail https://www.reuters.com/... https://twitter.com…
A Binance spokesman told us they did not consider our calculation accurate. In advance of our article, Binance published this blog describing its efforts to combat money laundering. “Crypto is an awful vehicle for laundering money,” it says 3/X https://www.binance.com/...
2.@Binance also became a key payment provider for Hydra, the world's largest darknet drugs market, according to blockchain data compiled for Reuters, a review of Hydra user forums, and interviews with drug users and researchers
1. North Korean hacking group Lazarus used @Binance to launder some of the $5.4 million in virtual currency stolen from Eterbase, a Slovakian firm. (The U.S. sanctioned Lazarus in 2019, saying its attacks were designed to support North Korea's nuclear weapons programmes.)
“For five years, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance served as a conduit for the laundering of at least $2.35 billion in illicit funds, a Reuters investigation has found.” https://www.reuters.com/...
In as little as nine minutes, using only encrypted email addresses as identification, North Korean hackers created Binance accounts and traded crypto stolen from Slovakian exchange Eterbase, account records show https://www.reuters.com/... @AABerwick @tomwilson1983 @specialreport…
How crypto giant @Binance became a hub for hackers, fraudsters and drug traffickers Our latest investigation - for five years Binance served as a conduit for the laundering of at least $2.35 billion in illicit crypto funds. With @AABerwick https://www.reuters.com/... https://twit…
NEW: For five years, a torrent of dirty money flowed through the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance. From North Korean hackers to Russian drug traffickers, we found Binance served as a conduit for the laundering of at least $2.35 billion: https://www.reuters.com/...