Anti-Human Trafficking Intelligence Agency Traces Cryptocurrency To Fight Modern-Day Slavery

Cryptocurrency could be a game-changer for combating crime, a notion illustrated by CipherTrace's newly formed partnership with the Anti-Human Trafficking Intelligence Initiative.

CipherTrace, a leader in blockchain security, has announced that it will join forces with ATII to use crypto analytics to advance the organization's goal of combatting global human trafficking.

"CipherTrace's partnership with ATII is in-depth, as we are serving on their advisory board, but also standing by for investigations when they need help. We will also be exchanging information with ATII involving human trafficking organizations and sources that can be tracked," Clegg told Cointelegraph.

"ATII has access to our console to conduct investigations for cryptocurrency's use in human trafficking. Additionally, I've conducted training with ATII to help them detect the interconnection between human trafficking and cryptocurrency, with the goal of understanding that we can follow the money for investigations," explained Clegg.

Tracing crypto to combat human traffickingUnder U.S. law, human trafficking, also referred to as modern-day slavery, falls under two definitions.

According to statistics from Human Rights First, human trafficking generates billions of dollars a year for traffickers.

"There are laws and regulations for anti-money laundering and terrorist financing, but a lot of these laws are not required for human trafficking. To get that message across and to get institutions to care, you have to leverage corporate responsibility and make that happen. As a non-profit, we are trying to bring anti-human trafficking programs, data, technology and training to financial institutions, like banks and crypto exchanges."

"There has been mounting concern about the use of cryptocurrency in Human Trafficking and Child Exploitation. It's is a high-risk threat in an unregulated world that is plagued by criminal activity."

Clegg pointed out that while it is still difficult to determine how much human trafficking is actually being funded by crypto, CipherTrace and ATII can get a better understanding of these numbers based on known information coming from money laundering or dark market transactions.

"The big difficulty we are facing now with human trafficking intelligence is that there are not good numbers showing how much human trafficking supports crypto or how much crypto is used to fund human trafficking. But most international agencies have information on logistical support for human trafficking, such as the movement of people. CipherTrace and ATII can work together to see how victims are being sold on the dark market and determine how much of that is funded through cryptocurrency."