Coinbase Teams Up with Irdeto to Crush Crypto-Powered Piracy
Big moves in crypto-land: Coinbase just locked arms with anti-piracy giant Irdeto to tackle the shady underbelly of digital content theft—funded by, you guessed it, cryptocurrency. Because nothing screams ’innovation’ like using decentralized money to rip off Game of Thrones.
The partnership aims to track and disrupt illicit transactions fueling pirate streaming services—because even crypto bros draw the line at free HBO.
Will it work? Who knows. But at least it gives Wall Street another reason to clutch its pearls about ’unregulated digital assets.’
Cutting Cybercrime Infra at Source
Irdeto’s investigations found that threat actors across the video entertainment and gaming ecosystems utilize crypto increasingly for illegal activities. The team has shared what it’s described as “a concerning trend.” Namely, the use of crypto by illicit service providers jumped from 13% in 2022 to 17% in 2023, and then to 19% by the end of 2024.
Therefore, the new partnership aims to disrupt cybercriminal infrastructure at the source, it says.
Irdeto is “committed to not only detecting threats but actively dismantling the infrastructure that supports them,” added Mulready. The company will also continue working closely with digital transaction providers and law enforcement agencies globally.
He added that partnerships, like the one with Coinbase, enhance the Payment Disruption service, thus helping to combat cybercrime across industries. Therefore, it’s actively signing more partnerships with crypto platforms. This will boost its ability to track crypto usage in illicit markets and remove critical financial enablers.
"The ultimate vision for crypto has always been economic freedom." – @brian_armstrong, co-founder of @coinbase
"The mission of Coinbase is to increase economic freedom in the world. It enables people to live a freer life and not have things taken away from them."
"If people are… pic.twitter.com/1v4CZrxKcq
According to John Kothanek, Coinbase’s VP at Global Intelligence, “partnering with Irdeto allows us to act swiftly on high-quality intelligence, disrupt malicious actors at an early stage and reinforce trust in the cryptocurrency ecosystem.”
Meanwhile, earlier in May, cybercriminals demanded $20 million in Bitcoin in an extortion attempt targeting the exchange and its customers. A few days later, the(DOJ) opened an investigation into the security breach.
In response to the incident, Coinbase’s chief legal officer Paul Grewal stated that “we have notified and are working with the DOJ and other US and international law enforcement agencies and welcome law enforcement’s pursuit of criminal charges against these bad actors.”
On 25 May, investors filed a class action lawsuit, alleging that the exchange failed to promptly disclose a serious data breach and a regulatory violation, and that these contributed to a drop in stock price.
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