Government bans nine exchanges including Binance and Kraken in Crypto Crackdown

India’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) has requested the effective ban of the nine crypto exchanges in the country, which include Binance and Kraken, in the latest move by governments against the industry.

A statement issued by the FIU, which regulates suspicious financial activity, said the exchanges were operating illegally in India because they weren’t registered with the agency and didn’t comply with anti-money laundering and anti-terrorist financing laws.

Accordingly, the FIU has requested that the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology block the websites of these exchanges: Binance, Kucoin, Huobi, Kraken, Gate.io, Bittrex, Bitsamp, MEXC Global, and Bitfinex.

FIU said that, in India, Virtual Digital Asset Service Providers (VDA SPs) are required to register with FIU IND as reporting entities and follow prescribed regulations as mandated under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) 2002.

The FIU has registered 31 such virtual digital asset service providers so far. Nevertheless, a “substantial” number of Indian users used unregistered exchanges, which prompted the latest action by the regulator.

National governments have taken action against major crypto exchanges once again. Earlier this month, the U.S. government fined Binance $4.3 billion for failing to comply with anti-money laundering laws.

Founder Changpeng Zhao stepped down as Binance’s CEO and pleaded guilty to violating U.S. anti-money laundering laws as part of the historic settlement. The United States has banned Zhao from leaving the country; he is due to be sentenced in February.