The Victorian Police Will be Given "Additional Powers" to Seize Cryptocurrencies from Offenders

The new bill would also demand crypto exchanges to provide information that might assist law enforcement in criminal investigations.

The Victorian Police Department in Australia will soon be able to seize cryptocurrencies and digital assets from criminals, as well as demand platforms to disclose information about suspects.

According to the statement from Premier Daniel Andrews released on Tuesday, new legislation was passed to the Victorian parliament on Tuesday. The Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 is intended to combat organized crime in the state.

The bill will also give law enforcement “much more power” to locate and seize digital assets as a result of the use of cryptocurrencies by organized crime, according to EY. The regulations will also require crypto exchanges to provide information in order for law enforcement to conduct criminal investigations just as banks do: “They will be able to compel cryptocurrency platforms to hand over information about suspects like banks currently must, and seize digital ‘wallets.’”

Under the Stop Online Piracy Act, police would have expanded search powers when executing search warrants and made it simpler for evildoers to relinquish their “illegally acquired property.”

Victorian Minister for Police, Anthony Carbines, said that criminals are changing their tactics and that “we need to be just as quick in equipping our police with the tools they need to cope with new types of crime.” Chainalysis, a popular cryptocurrency monitoring tool, estimated that at least $10 billion worth of cryptocurrency is stored in wallet addresses linked to criminal activity by early 2022.

Although Bacina noted that the analytics firm also states that illicit use is at its lowest rate in the crypto asset ecosystem, “so further reducing the illicit usage of digital assets can only instill greater confidence in the digital asset and cryptocurrency ecosystem”.

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