Scam haven Telegram has become the largest online black market for crypto
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Scam haven Telegram has become the largest online black market for crypto
Cyber black markets once lurked in the shadows of the dark web. Today, they have migrated to public platforms like Telegram and amassed unprecedented illicit wealth.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Andy Greenberg
Translated by: TechFlow
Once, online black markets lurked in the shadows of the dark web. Today, they've moved to public platforms like Telegram, amassing unprecedented illicit wealth.
More than a decade ago, when black markets for drugs, firearms, and various contraband first emerged on the dark web, the technical complexity of cryptocurrency and the anonymity software Tor seemed essential to enabling billions of dollars in illegal transactions.
But by 2025, that all looks outdated. Now, executing tens of billions of dollars in black market crypto transactions requires only a messaging app willing to host scammers and human traffickers, persistence in recreating channels and accounts when banned, and fluency in Chinese.
According to a recent analysis by cryptocurrency tracking firm Elliptic, the ecosystem of Chinese-language crypto scam markets based on the Telegram messaging service has now grown to an unprecedented scale. Despite a brief dip after Telegram banned two of the largest such markets in early 2025, the two current main markets—"Tudou Guarantee" and "Xinbi Guarantee"—now collectively facilitate nearly $2 billion in monthly transactions through money laundering, selling fraud tools (such as stolen data, fake investment websites, and AI face-swap tools), and other illicit services including surrogacy and underage prostitution.
Crypto romance scams and investment frauds are notoriously brutal "pig-butchering" operations, largely run from secret bases across Southeast Asia staffed by thousands of human trafficking victims. According to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), these scams alone steal around $10 billion annually from victims in the United States, making them one of the most profitable forms of cybercrime globally.
Markets like "Tudou Guarantee" and "Xinbi Guarantee" have rapidly expanded in size by providing money laundering services and other tools to these fraud organizations. "If you consider the illicit uses of crypto assets, there’s nothing bigger right now," said Tom Robinson, co-founder and chief scientist at Elliptic.
In fact, these criminal transaction markets aren’t just the largest online black markets today—they’re the largest in history. The once-dominant dark web market AlphaBay, known for selling drugs, stolen data, and hacking tools, conducted over $1 billion in transactions during its two-and-a-half-year operation, according to the FBI—ten times the peak volume of the original Silk Road dark web market. Russia's Hydra dark web market facilitated over $5 billion in transactions during its seven years of operation, providing money laundering services for cryptocurrency thieves and ransomware gangs.
In contrast, Elliptic data shows that the Chinese Telegram-based market "Huione Guarantee" completed a staggering $27 billion in transactions between 2021 and 2025—far surpassing all previous online black markets. Despite operating fully openly on Telegram, it has been called "the largest illegal online market in history."
Although Telegram banned "Huione Guarantee" in May this year—by then renamed "Haowang Guarantee"—due to its designation by the U.S. Department of Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) as a money laundering operation, the market did not disappear. "Tudou Guarantee," partially owned by Haowang, quickly filled the void. According to Elliptic, Tudou Guarantee now processes $1.1 billion monthly, nearly matching Haowang’s former $1.4 billion per month. Meanwhile, the second-largest crypto scam market, "Xinbi Guarantee," though also banned and later relaunched in May, has increased its monthly transaction volume to $850 million. Together, the two markets now exceed the total historical scale of prior markets, with Elliptic currently monitoring about 30 similar markets that collectively generate hundreds of billions in annual transactions.
In June, when WIRED contacted Telegram about how these markets were rebuilding their criminal empires in plain sight, the company’s response sparked controversy. Telegram stated it had decided against further bans, arguing these markets offer Chinese users a way to circumvent "capital controls" that often leave citizens with no alternative for international fund transfers. "We assess each report on a case-by-case basis and firmly reject blanket bans—especially when users are trying to evade oppressive restrictions imposed by authoritarian regimes," Telegram said in a statement to WIRED in June. "We remain steadfast in our commitment to protecting user privacy and defending fundamental freedoms, including financial autonomy."
This stance has drawn widespread criticism and raised questions: Can online crime be ignored under the banner of protecting privacy and freedom?
Elliptic and other fraud industry analysts strongly reject Telegram’s defense of market freedom, pointing out that the vast majority of activities on markets like "Tudou Guarantee" and "Xinbi Guarantee" are illegal. Beyond fraud-related services, these markets also facilitate prostitution—including posts on Xinbi Guarantee that contain suggestive advertisements for underage sexual services, such as "Lolita" or "young girls." Furthermore, victims of these fraud operations are widely documented to be subjected to forced labor in modern-day slavery-like conditions.
"They have the power to shut down this scam economy and human trafficking, yet they’ve become a 'classified ads platform' for crypto scammers," said Erin West, former prosecutor for Santa Clara County, California, and current leader of anti-scam organization Operation Shamrock. "These bad actors are using their bad platform to enable other bad actors."
Besides Telegram, another cryptocurrency company, Tether, plays a key role in these scam markets. This popular "stablecoin" is the preferred tool for money laundering transactions on these platforms. Unlike most cryptocurrencies, Tether has a centralized structure, meaning the company behind it (Tether Ltd.) can seize or freeze funds at any time. Yet, the company has done little to intervene in the massive flows of funds it enables.
Neither Telegram nor Tether responded to WIRED’s requests for comment regarding their roles in the black market transactions on "Tudou Guarantee" and "Xinbi Guarantee."
Jacob Sims, a visiting scholar at Harvard University's Asia Center who focuses on transnational crime research, argues that Tether and Telegram’s efforts to combat the expansion of the scam industry mirror the "symbolic" raids conducted by Southeast Asian law enforcement on scam compounds—actions that are often performative, after which the scam operations are allowed to rebuild and resume business. "Law enforcement failures at every level prevent effective action," Sims said.
Sims also notes that only coordinated international cooperation among governments and law enforcement agencies can bring meaningful change to this situation. He compares such efforts to global coordinated actions against terrorism or drug trafficking, arguing that similar international pressure should be applied to companies enabling the proliferation of scams.
"The current response to this growing scam industry hasn't reached that level of coordination or urgency," Sims said. "Only when we elevate it to a priority commensurate with the immense harm it causes will the problem stand a chance of being solved."
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