An Anatomy of Crypto-Enabled Cybercrimes

Will Cong (), Campbell Harvey, Daniel Rabetti () and Zong-Yu Wu ()
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Will Cong: S.C. Johnson College of Business, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14853; and International School of Finance, Fudan University, Shanghai 200437, China; and National Bureau of Economic Research, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
Daniel Rabetti: National University of Singapore Business School, Singapore, Singapore 119240
Zong-Yu Wu: Palo Alto Networks, London EC4V, United Kingdom

Management Science, 2025, vol. 71, issue 4, 3622-3633

Abstract: The advent of cryptocurrencies and digital assets holds the promise of improving financial systems by offering cheap, quick, and secure transfer of value. However, it also opens up new payment channels for cybercrimes. Assembling a diverse set of public on- and off-chain, proprietary, and hand-collected data, including attacker–victim negotiations and dark web conversations in Russian, we present an initial anatomy of crypto-enabled cybercrimes, highlighting relevant economic issues and proposing areas for future research. Among others, we find ransomware, as the most dominant organized crypto-enabled cybercrime, entails criminal gangs that operate like firms who adopt modern revenue models and carefully manage their reputations. We suggest that blanket restrictions on cryptocurrency usage may prove counterproductive. Instead, blockchain transparency enables effective forensics for tracking, monitoring, and shutting down dominant cybercriminal organizations, which potentially facilitates a more secure and reliable crypto ecosystem in the longer term.

Keywords: blockchain forensics; cybersecurity; ransomware; security breach disclosure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2023.03691 (application/pdf)

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Working Paper: An Anatomy of Crypto-Enabled Cybercrimes (2023)
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