The increase in the use and popularity of Bitcoin (BTC) and cryptocurrencies has also driven criminals to the crypto space and has led to an increase in fraud cases.
This has pushed countries and institutions to be cautious and prohibitive towards the cryptocurrency industry.
At this point, the last move came from Australian banks.
The growing scrutiny of the Australian authorities against the crypto industry has led banks to take drastic action in working with crypto exchanges and firms.
According to Bloomberg's report, National Australia Bank Ltd (NAB), one of the leading banks in Australia, has decided to restrict access to crypto platforms due to the risks arising from fraud events and announced that it has blocked payments to high-risk crypto exchanges.
With this move, NAB joins other major Australian banks such as Westpac Banking Corp., Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Australia & New Zealand Banking Group.
Chris Sheehan, head of fraud at NAB, said in a statement:
“Cryptocurrency crooks are part of organized, international criminal groups.
We are increasingly seeing them use cryptocurrency platforms to send stolen funds abroad quickly and often.
This prompted us to make a move against crypto exchanges. Because we found that almost 50% of the scam funds reported to the Australian Financial Crimes Exchange were crypto-linked in the last 30-day period.”
The bank did not disclose which exchanges were affected by this restriction decision.
Westpac Banking Corp., Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. has taken similar steps in recent weeks.
At this point, in early June, Commonwealth Bank, one of Australia's largest banks, announced that it would refuse some payments to cryptocurrency exchanges, citing concerns about fraudsters.
*Not investment advice.