On July 17th, the National Australia Bank (NAB) blocked over 270 million AUD (approximately 184 million USD) in customer payments due to concerns over fraudulent activities in the past four months.
Additionally, NAB also revealed that they had halted undisclosed transactions involving cryptocurrency platforms, where fraudulent activities were prevalent, from March 2023 to July 2023.
According to reports from the Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) in the past 30 days, NAB stated that up to 50% of the fraud cases reported to the agency were related to cryptocurrencies.
Last year, Australians lost 221 million AUD, equivalent to over 150 million USD, to cryptocurrency fraud, making it one of the fastest-growing threats in the country.
Australia is not the only country making efforts to prevent the use of cryptocurrencies by bad actors. In Europe, Belarus is enacting legislation to prohibit external cryptocurrency transactions not regulated by exchanges to combat cybercrime.