The latest developments in the crypto child porn case have revealed that the privacy-centric cryptocurrency Monero was used for payments by the criminals. The association of cryptocurrency is bringing a bad image to the cryptocurrency sphere where the operations were on encrypted messenger Telegram.
While on the other hand, after the signing of a petition by over five million South Koreans, Korean authorities have named 25-year-old Cho Ju-bin as the alleged ringleader of a Telegram message group called Doctor’s Room.
Ju-bin was reportedly charging 200,000 to 1.5 million Korean won ($160-$1200) to have access to pictures and videos of women mostly less than 16 years of age who forcefully performed sexually explicit acts.
Using Monero makes it a crypto child porn case?
In the investigation, it was found that Cho Ju-bin mainly dealt with Monero (XMR), a privacy increasing cryptocurrency. He used the cryptocurrency for covering up his tracks. Cho is accused of violation of child protection, privacy, and abuse act along with the charges related to blackmailing, abusing, and threatening others. The use of cryptocurrency does not make the child pornography ring a crypto child porn case; however, it makes it impossible to take Cho’s money away without his consent.
In 2018, the Supreme Court of South Korea, following a case, considered cryptocurrencies to be a type of property subject to forfeit. However, there are certain complications, as authorities have to get hold of the wallets which have digital assets stored in them along with the private key in order to access them. A Korean lawyer Han Seo-hee stated that in case he refuses to submit the key, there is no way Mr. Cho could be forced.
However, it has been found that Cho had received over 8,800 Ether (worth $1.2 million) from over 500 wallets from all over the world; most of the payment was in Monero.
Monero has these special characteristics which enable it to jumble the transactions together and making it impossible for the third parties to trace the payments. While in other cryptocurrencies, transactions can be viewed publicly. So, without Cho’s cooperation, it would not be possible for the authorities to know the amount he had received in the alleged crypto child porn case.
The case has instigated a drive against child porn in the country and recently leading South Korean exchanges also announced a joint venture to fight against child pornography.
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