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Handbook on Countering the Misuse of Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers for Terrorism Financing Purposes

The United Nations Counter-Terrorism Centre (UNCCT) of the United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism (UNOCT), the Federal Financial Monitoring Service of the Russian Federation (Rosfinmonitoring), and the Eurasian Group on Combating Money Laundering and Financing of Terrorism (EAG) launched, on 9 September 2024, a joint knowledge product, titled: “Countering the Misuse of Virtual Assets and Virtual Asset Service Providers for Terrorism Financing Purposes: Handbook Based on EAG practices.”

The context

The emergence of Virtual Assets (VAs) and Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) has brought significant positive changes to our world, driving innovation, enhancing efficiency, and promoting financial inclusion. However, certain characteristics of VAs also make them attractive to criminals, especially with the development of sophisticated digital tools such as mixers, tumblers, and anonymizers, which are designed to obscure transactional links to the original currency owners.

Facing varying levels of risk posed by the exploitation of VAs and VASPs by terrorist entities, Member States of the Eurasian Group on Combating Money Laundering and Financing of Terrorism (EAG) have made considerable and commendable progress in integrating digital financial technologies into their domestic systems, demonstrating a strong commitment to enhance their financial systems while ensuring compliance with relevant international standards.

“As the international community continues to place an emphasis on countering the financing of terrorism, we need to be able to respond to the evolving threat landscape together,” said Mr. Voronkov, Under-Secretary-General, UNOCT

Publications

 

and are available in: English

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and the United Nations (UN) have established critical frameworks aimed at mitigating the risks associated with the use of VAs and VASPs for criminal and terrorist financing purposes.

FATF Recommendation 15 provides a blueprint for implementing a risk-based approach to either prohibiting or regulating virtual assets, emphasizing the need to identify, assess, and manage specific risks in this domain.

In its , the United Nations Security Council called upon Member States to enhance the traceability and transparency of financial transactions by assessing and addressing potential risks associated with virtual assets1.