U.S. Department of the Treasury Sanctions Eight Crypto Wallets Allegedly Tied to Iran-Backed Houthi Rebels

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has imposed sanctions against a network of financial facilitators and procurement operatives that provide supplies to the Houthis, an Iran-backed terrorist organization that has launched attacks against dozens of ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.

In a statement, the OFAC says that it has taken action against a Houthi network working with Sa’id al-Jamal, a financial facilitator with ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF).

Al-Jamal’s network has procured millions worth of weapons and other commodities from Russia, including stolen Ukrainian grain, and shipped the goods to the Houthis in Yemen.

The new sanction includes eight crypto wallets that the OFAC says the Houthis used to transfer funds associated with their activities. The development makes it illegal to transact with these crypto addresses.

“Unless authorized by a general or specific license issued by OFAC or exempt, U.S. sanctions generally prohibit all transactions by US persons or within (or transiting) the United States that involve any property or interests in property of designated or otherwise blocked persons.”

According to the blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, two of the crypto addresses were already linked to Sa’id al-Jamal. The other wallets have ties to entities that Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing (NBCTF) has flagged as involved in terrorist financing.

On-chain analysis likewise shows that millions of dollars’ worth of funds moved from these wallets to those belonging to other high-risk and OFAC-sanctioned entities, as well as manufacturers and sellers of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and anti-UAV equipment connected to China and Russia.

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