The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) collaborated to host a comprehensive training course on cryptocurrencies and Darknet investigations in an effort to combat cybercrime and stay ahead of evolving digital threats. From June 19-23, training was provided by the OSCE Programme Office in Astana and hosted by the Law Enforcement Academy under the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Republic of Kazakhstan.
There were around 20 people in attendance, including those from the Prosecutor General’s Law Enforcement Academy and the Ministry of Internal Affairs’ Almaty and Karaganda Academies. Two highly regarded German and Ukrainian international specialists conducted the program and imparted their wisdom and expertise to the participants.
Details of the course
The first section of the course laid the groundwork for future learning about blockchain and digital currency. The course covered the fundamentals of cryptocurrency profiling, tracking, and seizure, and included hands-on activities. A representative from Binance, the biggest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, gave a presentation, which was a major highlight. In doing so, they offer light on the real-world uses of law enforcement’s work with cryptocurrency exchanges in the context of criminal investigations.
In the course’s second half, students learned about the Darknet and how the Tor network works, two key components of online anonymity for criminals. Participants learned about the criminal ecosystem of the Darknet and discussed efficient methods for searching and investigating inside it.
Vice-Rector of the Prosecutor General’s Law Enforcement Academy Maralbek Eshimov stressed the significance of the training in light of Kazakhstan’s growing crypto-use and its status as a major Bitcoin mining hub. He emphasized the need of training law enforcement professionals to deal with the rising usage of cryptocurrencies in criminal activity.
Training like this is part of a larger extra-budgetary OSCE project called “Capacity Building on Combating Cybercrime in Central Asia,” which is supported by the United States, Germany, and the Republic of Korea. Trainings on how to handle digital evidence and how to obtain electronic evidence from overseas have been previously performed as part of this initiative, which aims to improve regional capacities in resisting cyber threats.
