Chainalysis and Integra win $ 1.25 million IRS contract to break Monero

Crypto intelligence firm Chainalysis and data forensics firm Integra Fec won a combined $ 1.25 million contract to provide privacy-focused coin-breaking tools, monero, for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) of the United States.

Fluctuated in early September, the one-year contract specifically covers transactions involving monero (XMR) and second tier payment solutions such as the bitcoin lightning network (LN), features considered by the IRS as channels for criminal financial activity .

Privacy coins are created primarily for the purpose of hiding financial transactions from unwanted attention, such as law enforcement.

But the IRS is paying both Chainalysis and Integra up to $ 625,000 each – a total of $ 1.25 million – to do just that, track obfuscated wallet addresses and transaction amounts.

Under the original request, companies will receive an advance of $ 500,000 each to develop the required tracking tool, and then another $ 125,000 if the submitted solution is successful and approved. A business presentation is expected in eight months. Testing and development will take place over the next 120 days.

The IRS hopes the solution will help track transactions for a specific user, identify specific transaction details, and provide specific information about network activity.

Chainalysis has previously claimed that it can track 99% of transactions involving Zcash and nearly all of Dash’s coins which both imagine themselves to be private and untraceable.

But that’s only because most users don’t use the optional privacy-enhancing features available on the two blockchains.

What do you think about the IRS targeting privacy coins? Let us know in the comments section below.

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