Bitcoin Not Useful for Terrorists, Expert Tells US Congress

Despite scattered reports and fears about crypto’s potential use in facilitating terror activities, multiple bitcoin fundraising attempts have failed and cash remains substantially more useful to terrorists.

This was the message delivered by Yaya Fanusie, director of analysis for the Foundation For Defense of Democracies Center on Sanctions and Illicit Finance in a prepared testimony delivered to the House Financial Services Committee on Friday, Sept. 7.

‘Cold hard cash is still king’

According to Fanusie’s testimony, a number of terrorist groups including al-Qaeda and the Islamic State have attempted to raise funds using cryptocurrency several times without achieving any notable success.

Buttressing this point, Fanusie mentioned the example of a terror group known as Mujahideen Shura Council (MSC) in the Environs of Jerusalem, which carried out a crypto fundraising campaign for several weeks in 2016 and ended up netting just a little over $500 in donations.