South Korea's tax authority is preparing a nationwide system to monitor cryptocurrency transactions, including funds held in non-custodial wallets.

Scope and capabilities

The platform will analyze fund flows in real time between addresses and exchanges, aiming to cover approximately 70 million assets and 45 blockchains.

Planned monitoring includes wallets such as MetaMask, cross-chain transfers, and interactions with centralized trading platforms to increase visibility into asset movements.

• Real-time analytics will trace flows between addresses and exchanges to detect patterns consistent with tax evasion and illicit transfers.
• The system aims to index roughly 70 million distinct assets and process transactions across 45 blockchains for comprehensive oversight.
• Tools for analyzing mixing services are planned to assist deanonymization of funds routed through tumblers and obfuscation techniques.
• Authorities expect the technology to support investigations into offshore accounts, gift transfers, and inheritance-related tax avoidance schemes.

Objectives and implementation

The primary goal is enforcement of tax rules by identifying undeclared income and transfers intended to avoid taxation through opaque crypto channels.

Implementation will likely involve collaboration with domestic exchanges and technical partners to ensure reliable data ingestion and cross-platform correlation capabilities.

Privacy and oversight questions

The announcement did not provide detailed safeguards or public timelines, leaving open questions about legal oversight and protections for user privacy.

Civil society groups stress the need for judicial authorization, data minimization, and transparency on algorithmic processes used to monitor private wallets.

Officials have not disclosed a launch date; authorities are expected to publish further details as the system moves toward operational testing and evaluation.