US Government Will Replenish Budget Through Crypto Confiscations in 2022

Reading Time: < 1 minute

The US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) plans to recover billions of dollars worth of cryptos in delinquent cases next year, Bloomberg reports.

During the 2021 fiscal year, the department replenished the treasury with cryptos by $3.5 billion. This is the equivalent of 93% of all seized assets in criminal investigations – cases of electronic fraud, money laundering, drug trafficking and tax fraud.

The figure includes 69,370 BTC confiscated in the case of the darknet marketplace Silk Road. The division also brought to justice a former Microsoft dev who used cryptocurrencies to hide $10 million he appropriated from the company.

Jim Lee, head of the IRS’s criminal investigation department, said:

“I expect this trend to continue in the next fiscal year. Cryptocurrencies are involved in an increasing number of crimes.”

The IRS Criminal Investigation Department has prioritized training and implementing technologies for analyzing cryptocurrencies and blockchains to uncover complex cyber-financial criminal schemes. To that end, Northern Virginia will open an Advanced Collaboration and Data Center next year.

According to Lee, the IRS may request additional funding of $80 billion to meet these goals.