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    <p>Academics at the University of Texas claim to have traced over $75 billion of crypto flows linked to social engineering scams known as ‘pig butchering.’</p>
    <p>However, blockchain forensics expert Taylor Monahan suspects that this figure is inflated by “a few orders of magnitude.”</p>
    <p>Metamask’s Monahan, a longstanding figure in the crypto community known for her recent painstaking on-chain tracing of the Lazarus Group, has specifically raised concerns over the study’s methodology.</p>
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       <p lang="en" dir="ltr">I keep getting sent this paper on Pig Butchering and, yes, I've read it numerous times now.<br><br>The finer details and some of the tracing methodology within are…okay.<br><br>But the big takeaways—and especially the $75.3 billion dollar number—are fully fucking absurd. pic.twitter.com/8klgC3B8bc</p>— Tay (@tayvano_) March 11, 2024
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    <p><em>Read more: North Korean group Lazarus behind $70M crypto exchange attacks, report</em></p>
    <p>Monahan s<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" title="US" href="https://thebittimes.com/tag/us.html">US</a>pects that the authors have double-counted funds and misinterpreted some of the addresses involved, such as a decentralized exchange, OTC desks, and brokers who service the scammers.</p>
    <p>One of Monahan’s key criticisms is that, despite the authors noting the possibility of double-counting recirculated funds, they summed all inflows to end-point addresses, an approach characterized as ‘charging on anyways.’</p>
    <p>Compared to previous studies, the $75 billion total appears extremely high. Blockchain forensics and compliance firm Chainalysis, for example, puts the total at $1 billion, noting that “the true total is likely higher.” However, such a discrepancy between estimates seems unfeasible.</p>
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       <p lang="en" dir="ltr">One key trend covered in our Crypto Crime Report: The intersection of approval phishing and romance scamming (sometimes known as “pig butchering”). We tracked over $1B in victim losses to these scams from 2021-2023, but the true number is likely higher. https://t.co/5cRD7VgNrN pic.twitter.com/8sk4GwluZz</p>— Chainalysis (@chainalysis) March 7, 2024
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    <p>Totals aside, the pig butchering industry is a big, and horrifying, problem.</p>
    <p><em>Read more: Single Chinese ‘pig-butchering’ operation made $100M in USDT, report</em></p>
    <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-what-is-pig-butchering">What is ‘pig butchering’?&nbsp;</h2>
    <p>Pig butchering, from the Chinese 杀猪盘, is the name given to a class of online social engineering scams that lure in victims via dating apps or social media. Payments are then extracted from victims by leveraging a supposed romantic relationship, or through the promise of lucrative investment opportunities.</p>
    <p>Those conducting the scams are often themselves victims of organized crime, enslaved in so-called ‘scam farm’ compounds across Southeast Asia, particularly Myanmar.</p>
    <p>Monahan urges more caution in studying the intersection between slavery and crypto, recommending a UN <a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" title="report" href="https://thebittimes.com/tag/report.html">report</a> from last year.</p>
    <p><em>Read more: 1,200 slaves freed from Myanmar pig-<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" title="butchering" href="https://thebittimes.com/tag/butchering.html">butchering</a> compound</em></p>
    <h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="ineffective-controls">Ineffective controls</h2>
    <p>Those in charge of moving the proceeds of pig butchering scams are unfazed by the controls that centralized exchanges and stablecoins are meant to have in place.</p>
    <p>The paper states that “perpetrators interact freely with major crypto exchanges” such as Binance, Huobi, and OKX, evidently bypassing any effective know-your-c<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" title="US" href="https://thebittimes.com/tag/us.html">US</a>tomer (KYC) controls.</p>
    <p>The scammers are also clearly unafraid of using USDT, the stablecoin which the report identifies as 84% of the volume studied, despite Tether’s ability to freeze any funds tied to illicit activity.&nbsp;</p>
    <p>As the paper’s abstract states: “Our findings highlight how the ‘reputable’ crypto ind<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" title="US" href="https://thebittimes.com/tag/us.html">US</a>try provides the common gateways and exit points for massive amounts of criminal capital flows.”</p>
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<p>Source: <a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow" target="_blank" href="https://thebittimes.com/blockchain-forensics-expert-has-doubts-over-75b-pig-butchering-report-tbt82250.html">https://thebittimes.com/blockchain-forensics-expert-has-doubts-over-75b-pig-butchering-report-tbt82250.html</a></p>

Blockchain forensics expert has doubts over $75B ‘pig butchering’ report

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