Peer-to-Peer Cryptocurrency Trading Platforms

• Criminals engage in trades directly with counterparties, often with minimal identity verification, merging illicit funds with legitimate user activity.
• The direct user-to-user model conceals the original source of funds, making it difficult to isolate tainted transactions.

• Operators may unofficially function as remittance providers, matching buyers and sellers of crypto without formal oversight.
• This setup masks the true source of funds and does not enforce robust KYC, allowing criminals to move value undetected.

• Facilitate direct user-to-user crypto trades with minimal oversight, allowing rapid cash-to-crypto and crypto-to-cash conversions outside formal exchange mechanisms.
• Frequently operate with lax or no KYC requirements, letting criminal groups conduct transactions discreetly and evade standard AML controls.

• Anonymous networking allows users to circumvent platform IP checks, enabling cross-border trades without revealing true identities or locations.
• Minimal or easily circumvented KYC requirements, combined with hidden IP addresses, impede oversight and facilitate laundering through quick, direct user-to-user transfers.

• Criminals can hide their IP addresses when trading, appearing to operate in low-risk areas despite being physically located in high-risk or sanctioned regions.
• VPN-based anonymity complicates detection of potentially correlated or suspicious transaction patterns between buyers and sellers.
• This heightened secrecy enables layering activities by allowing trades to remain off regulators’ radars.

• Criminals coordinate trades from open WiFi hotspots to avoid linking activity to a fixed location or device.
• Rapid shifting of public networks complicates detection of repeat high-risk traders and hinders the identification of beneficial owners.

• Multi-hop VPN usage enables criminals to appear in multiple or conflicting locations, circumventing IP-based restrictions or blacklists.
• This masking technique hinders detection of collusive trading patterns and complicates consistent identification of suspicious transactions.

• Users connect directly for crypto trades, and combining Tor with a VPN obscures both parties' locations and IP addresses.
• This anonymity fosters untraceable transfers, as participants can sidestep stricter AML controls through decentralized interactions.

• Criminals execute recurring small crypto trades across various accounts to remain under institutional or regulatory thresholds.
• The decentralized, user-driven nature of these trades reduces centralized oversight, facilitating structuring.

• Criminals can fragment funds into small crypto transactions, each below typical exchange reporting requirements.
• The decentralized nature of P2P trades further obscures aggregated transaction volume.

• These decentralized trading venues enable direct user-to-user exchanges of in-game currency and cryptocurrency with minimal oversight. • The reduced AML checks and pseudonymous nature allow launderers to rapidly convert or trade game-related assets, concealing illicit fund origins.

• Remote mining proceeds can be exchanged directly with counterparties, often with limited or no KYC procedures.
• This decentralized approach bypasses conventional monitoring, letting criminals obscure the origins of newly minted coins by spreading them across multiple trades.

• Criminals create multiple user profiles under synthetic identities, leveraging minimal oversight when trading directly with other participants.
• They exploit escrow or dispute-resolution mechanisms by continually changing personal details, making it difficult to pinpoint the real accountholder.

• Criminals combine sham e-commerce listings with direct crypto-for-fiat trades, leveraging pseudonymous handles to further obscure beneficial ownership.
• Limited or no central oversight in peer-to-peer transactions complicates regulatory monitoring, facilitating cross-border layering of illicit proceeds.

• These services allow traffickers to purchase and sell cryptocurrencies directly among users, often circumventing centralized exchange compliance.
• Shell profiles or collusive traders help veil the illicit origin of funds tied to forced prostitution or child exploitation.

• Facilitate user-to-user crypto trades under lax or variable KYC requirements, enabling anonymity for illicit actors.
• Avoid centralized record-keeping, making the origin and flow of child exploitation proceeds more difficult to track.

• Criminals can directly trade game-related tokens or proceeds for cryptocurrency, leveraging minimal oversight.
• Multiple user accounts enable layered transfers, obscuring the ultimate beneficial owner.

• Enable direct user-to-user trades often without robust KYC, complicating AML oversight.
• Allow criminals to fragment transactions into smaller amounts and rapidly swap tokens under pseudonymous profiles, hindering detection of the original source of funds.

• Enable direct user-to-user token trades without a central intermediary, often with limited AML checks.
• Support structuring by letting criminals break up transfers into smaller amounts to fly under reporting thresholds.

• Criminals leverage direct person-to-person trading of governance tokens without centralized intermediaries, reducing oversight.
• These platforms often have less stringent identification processes, allowing illicit actors to mask ownership and transact anonymously.

• Criminals exploit minimal KYC requirements to trade utility tokens directly between unknown parties, often using escrow features that enable near-anonymous transfers.
• Through frequent P2P trades, they fragment the transaction chain, making it difficult for investigators to follow the flow of illicit funds.

• Criminals can exploit weaker KYC/AML controls on P2P platforms to conduct quick, repeated trades that layer illicit proceeds.
• They orchestrate micro-transactions under reporting thresholds, making it difficult for authorities to detect or trace funds effectively.

• Launderers use peer-to-peer trades to exchange peeled crypto portions with minimal or inconsistent KYC, further obscuring traceability.
• The fragmented nature of peel chain transfers aligns with using direct user-to-user deals, reducing reliance on centralized controls.

• Platforms typically rely on remote user verification, which can be subverted with doctored documents or synthetic IDs.
• Offenders exploit the absence of robust live operator checks to register accounts repeatedly, each time altering personal details slightly.
• Facilitates undisclosed cross-border crypto exchanges under assumed identities, further concealing illicit proceeds.

• Minimal oversight can allow multiple user accounts to coordinate manipulative trades, quickly inflating or deflating asset prices.
• Wash trading is facilitated by direct user-to-user trades that lack robust order book transparency or centralized monitoring.

• Direct, user-to-user trades can be arranged between collusive parties to repeatedly buy and sell the same cryptocurrency, generating fictitious trading activity.
• Limited oversight or inconsistent identification checks on some P2P platforms facilitate coordinated wash trades, masking the illicit origin of proceeds.

• Enable direct, often minimally regulated crypto-to-crypto or crypto-to-fiat trades, adding anonymity for illicit darknet funds.
• Decentralized structure or limited KYC requirements hinder the ability of authorities to track the true origin or destination of proceeds.

• Facilitate direct user-to-user trades where counterparties can be controlled by the same individuals, enabling matched buy/sell orders.
• The decentralized nature and absence of central order matching allow offsetting trades to proceed with limited AML monitoring.

• Enable direct user-to-user crypto trades without a centralized intermediary, often providing minimal identity verification or transaction monitoring.
• Criminals exploit these platforms to rapidly transact large volumes of cryptocurrency across multiple accounts, further obscuring audit trails.
• Commonly utilized in regions with limited AML enforcement, facilitating cross-border operations and complicating investigations.

• Allow direct and often anonymized exchanges of cryptocurrencies among users, bypassing traditional oversight.
• Support rapid, micro-scale conversions across multiple crypto assets, reducing transparency and complicating AML checks.

• Direct user-to-user transactions often lack robust KYC/AML checks, allowing criminals to swap illicitly obtained mainstream crypto for privacy coins anonymously.
• By arranging private trades and avoiding centralized oversight, they can obscure the flow of funds and hamper investigators’ efforts to trace transactions.

• Enable direct user-to-user trades with fewer compliance requirements, making it easier to avoid AML controls.
• Limited or non-standard KYC allows quick layering of illicit funds while dispersing transactions across multiple parties.

• Offer direct user-to-user crypto trades with often minimal KYC, enabling funds to be moved off traditional finance rails.
• Criminals may split transactions across multiple wallets, blurring audit trails and frustrating investigative tracing.

• Enable direct exchanges of cryptocurrencies without centralized oversight, reducing traceability for sanctioned entities.
• Escrow services and private negotiation features can mask transaction details, complicating sanctions screening.

• Direct trading options allow drug proceeds to be exchanged for digital assets without passing through highly regulated centralized venues.
• Escrow features and dispersed counterparties reduce traceability, complicating financial investigations aiming to identify beneficial owners.

• Allow direct conversion of illicit earnings from falsified pharmaceutical sales into cryptocurrency without centralized oversight.
• Minimal KYC requirements and the option to transact under false identities make these platforms attractive for obscuring money flows.

• Perpetrators rapidly offload or distribute rug-pulled tokens through P2P trades.
• Using direct trades and decentralized dispute processes reduces transparent oversight, helping criminals remain partially anonymous.
• The fragmented nature of P2P transactions further complicates funds tracing and hinders AML investigations.

Direct, user-to-user trades convert cryptojacked assets with minimal oversight, breaking links to source wallets and defeating exchange-level controls.