What is it about?
Cryptocurrencies are increasingly being used by criminals. In consequence, Law Enforcement Agencies receive an increasing number of requests for the delivery of training sessions relating to tracing cryptocurrency transactions. This paper analyses trends in criminal activity and then describes the collaborative design and develop of Cryptopol, a serious game for teaching cryptocurrency tracing techniques to Law Enforcement and then analyses the deployment of the serious game.
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Why is it important?
Data shows that criminal networks are increasingly using cryptocurrency for a significant amount of criminal activity due to the perceived anonymity they provide. In 2023, illicit transaction volumes reached $24.2 billion. This paper describes the development of a first-of-its kind cryptocurrency-tracing training game, Cryptopol. Starting from 2014, Law Enforcement Agencies received increasing requests for assistance in tracing cryptocurrency, creating an urgent need for targeted training for investigators. This led to the idea to create an online serious game, which could deliver an effective training to a wider audience than is possible through in-person training. Serious games are gaining popularity with empirical evidence showing that they can increase knowledge acquisition. This paper describes the process for defining the requirements, followed by the design and development of the serious game. It provides insights into the considerations and steps taken while co-designing Cryptopol with its intended end-users, i.e., cryptocurrency investigators. The learning from this process aims to support developers aiming to create successful serious games for the law enforcement domain.
Perspectives
Co-authors of this paper are leading figures within the field of tracing cryptocurrency transactions whose experience was invaluable both in terms of ensuring the serious game that was designed and developed was effective, while also providing great insights into the current trends within the field. Utilising this experience ensured that Cryptopol is effective in providing training to a wider audience than would be possible through in person training. This led to it being awarded the Best Freeware Innovation Award in the 2023 European Commission’s Security Innovation Awards. At the time writing the game has trained over 1,500 cryptocurrency investigators in over 550 countries.
Paul Hancock
Sheffield Hallam University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Design of Cryptopol: A serious game for teaching cryptocurrency tracing techniques to Law Enforcement, Games Research and Practice, November 2024, ACM (Association for Computing Machinery),
DOI: 10.1145/3697845.
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