CNBC interviewed Sharon Cohen Levin on the government’s seizures and auctions of cryptocurrency. The U.S. government has seized $1.2 billion in cryptocurrency this fiscal year, including bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin and other currencies. But, the article notes, it was the 2013 takedown of the online black market known as Silk Road where federal agents “really cut their teeth in crypto search and seizure.”
Sharon worked on the Silk Road prosecution during her time leading the Money Laundering and Asset Forfeiture Unit in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. “It was totally unprecedented,” she told CNBC. “There was a wallet with approximately 30,000 bitcoins in it, which we were able to identify and seize. At the time, it was probably the largest bitcoin seizure ever, and it sold for around $19 million.” Today, that same wallet would be worth $1.1 billion. To read the full article, click here.