Criminal organizations in Ireland have begun to store seed phrases and private keys for cryptocurrency wallets in rented safety deposit boxes. This information was revealed by Michael Gabbins, head of the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB), in an interview with the Sunday Independent.
Gabbins noted that the agency uncovered this practice during investigations and has reported its findings to a government committee focused on anti-money laundering efforts.
The committee is preparing the nation for new European Union regulations set to take effect in the summer of 2027. These rules will prohibit cash transactions exceeding €10,000 and require customer identification for cash expenditures over €3,000. Providers of cryptocurrency services, luxury goods sellers, and crowdfunding platforms will face increased scrutiny. In August 2026, Ireland published its first national strategy to combat money laundering.
According to Gabbins, criminal groups are utilizing digital assets to minimize the risk of confiscation and to exploit the perceived anonymity of cryptocurrencies. However, he remarked that the use of cryptocurrencies in the Irish criminal landscape is still relatively basic, with cash remaining dominant in drug trafficking.
In parallel, the CAB is investigating the activities of professional money launderers, including hawala operators, estimating their fees at around 6%. In one case, the bureau seized €230,000 from a safety deposit box at a private storage company.
Additionally, CAB's largest seizure of crypto assets to date occurred in March 2026, when, with the assistance of Europol, the bureau gained access to the first of 12 wallets containing 6,000 BTC that had been seized in 2019 as part of a cannabis cultivation case. The private keys to these wallets had been recorded and hidden in a fishing rod case, which was subsequently lost.
Gabbins stated that CAB has already liquidated more than €130 million worth of cryptocurrency from a total estimated value of €360 million. In 2025, the agency returned nearly €15 million to the Irish treasury.
It is worth noting that Irish authorities have classified crypto assets as sectors with "very significant" risks of money laundering and terrorist financing.