ChainCatcher news, Fox reporter Eleanor Terrett posted on the X platform stating that SEC Chairman Gary Gensler mentioned that due to the permissionless nature of blockchain, DeFi faces challenges in enforcing anti-money laundering laws.

ChainCatcher news, according to NBC, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey's fintech company Block is under a compliance investigation by federal prosecutors. Internal documents provided by a former employee to the Southern District of New York prosecutors indicate that Block's Square and Cash App businesses have long-standing and widespread compliance deficiencies.These issues include: insufficient collection of customer information to assess risk; Square processed thousands of transactions involving sanctioned countries; Block handled multiple cryptocurrency transactions for terrorist organizations; and most suspicious transactions involving credit cards, dollar transfers, and Bitcoin were not accurately reported to the government.Block stated that it has established a comprehensive compliance program and continues to invest to address new threats and the evolving sanctions regulatory environment. However, the former employee claimed that the company did not take corrective actions after discovering violations. Additionally, an external consulting firm found nearly 50 deficiencies in Block's internal monitoring system last year.It is reported that Block's payment application Verse in Europe was also fined by the Bank of Lithuania last year and ordered to rectify for "serious and systemic" violations of anti-money laundering and anti-terrorism financing laws.As one of the most popular mobile payment applications in the United States, Cash App has 56 million active users, but its banking partner Sutton Bank recently reached a settlement with the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) over issues such as violations of the Bank Secrecy Act. Financial regulators are intensifying compliance reviews of third-party payment institutions.

ChainCatcher news, the European Parliament has voted to pass a new set of laws tightening anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing measures across the EU. These laws target large cash payments, cryptocurrency companies, and football clubs, among others. In addition to creating a single rulebook for the 27 EU countries, the package approved on Thursday also establishes an anti-money laundering agency based in Frankfurt, responsible for overseeing the implementation of the relevant frameworks, particularly those that the EU deems most important.The new laws include strengthened due diligence measures and checks on customer identities, after which so-called obligated entities (such as banks, asset and cryptocurrency managers, or real estate and virtual real estate brokers) must report suspicious activities to financial intelligence units and other competent authorities.

ChainCatcher news, according to CoinDesk, blockchain startup Kinto announced that it has completed $5 million in funding this year to develop an Ethereum Layer 2 network compliant with anti-money laundering laws based on the OP Stack, aimed at connecting financial institutions and real-world assets through DeFi.According to RootData, Kinto received $1.5 million in Pre-Seed funding from Kyber Capital Crypto earlier this year.Recently, Kinto completed another $3.5 million in funding, led by Kyber Capital Crypto, Spartan Group, and Parafi, with participation from SkyBridge Capital, Kraynos, Soft Holdings, Deep Ventures, Modular, Tane, and Robot Ventures.

According to ChainCatcher, The Block reported that U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren stated during a Senate hearing on Tuesday that she plans to reintroduce relevant legislation with Senator Roger Marshall to expand anti-money laundering laws to a wide range of the cryptocurrency ecosystem, including digital asset wallet providers, miners, validators, and other blockchain network participants, and noted that current anti-money laundering rules are not adequately applicable to crypto companies.Previously, Elizabeth Warren and Roger Marshall proposed a bill last December aiming to prohibit banks and other financial institutions from transacting with digital asset mixers, requiring the Treasury to conduct anti-money laundering compliance examinations on registered large U.S. cryptocurrency companies. (source link)