The post Crypto Flows to Suspected Human Trafficking Services Jump 85% in 2025: Chainalysis appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com.

In brief Recruitment payments tied to labor trafficking typically range between $1,000 and $10,000. Prostitution and escort networks are turning to stablecoins. CSAM sites disproportionately rely on U.S.-based hosting infrastructure, according to geographic analysis. Crypto use in suspected human trafficking rose 85% in 2025, reaching “hundreds of millions of dollars across identified services,” according to Chainalysis. Released Thursday, the 2026 Crypto Crime Report tracked payments tied to escort services, labor recruitment for Southeast Asian scam compounds, and vendors of child sexual abuse material, or CSAM. According to the firm’s intelligence analyst, Tom McLouth, the findings mark an industry-defining moment. “I haven’t seen anyone talk about human trafficking holistically within the current crypto ecosystem and how it’s being leveraged,” he told Decrypt. “I think one of the primary reasons is that this is a relatively taboo subject. People don’t like to sit at the dinner table and talk about CSAM and industrialized exploitation.”  The findings come as crypto faces renewed scrutiny in criminal investigations. Justice Department disclosures have detailed early crypto investments by Jeffrey Epstein and his connections to high-profile industry figures. At the same time, a reported Bitcoin ransom demand in the kidnapping case involving Nancy Guthrie, mother of “Today” show anchor Savannah Guthrie, has drawn significant media attention. McLouth said large-scale crypto-linked crime is harder to personalize than cases tied to well-known names. “We’re not able to say this one specific person is doing this one specific crime,” he said. “Jeffrey Epstein, as we see in the news, is a name everyone can latch onto. But for an entire ecosystem, an entire industry, we’re not able to do that.” While some reports citing Chainalysis showed that crypto transactions linked to suspected trafficking operations jumped 85% in 2025 to $260 million, Decrypt was unable to independently verify that figure. “We are measuring…

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Filed under: News - @ February 13, 2026 12:25 am