14 DAY TRIAL // Most massively multiplayer online games usually have a zero tolerance when it comes to annoying gold farmers spamming world chat, and they are apparently right to do so.
Information Systems researcher Jean-Loup Richet put together a report on online money laundering via various means last year, for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, detailing how various online services can be utilized in order for criminals to launder money.
According to his report, the darker note of the virtual currency trade is the fact that games like Second Life and World of Warcraft and other such titans make it easy for criminals to make use of in-game trade in order to move large amounts of currency to each other, by opening multiple accounts in various geographical areas, and in multiple games.
The trade function of massively multiplayer online role-playing games enables them to launder money and transfer large sums over international borders. The currency can then be exchanged back for real money by selling it as a gold farmer would, leaving no evidence that law enforcement agencies can follow.
This is made even more complicated by the emergent popularity of virtual credit cards and prepaid credit cards. The researcher analyzed various forums in order to identify how people were moving their money around online, by using anonymous transactions.
"Millions of transactions take place over the internet each day, and criminal organisations are taking advantage of this fact to launder illegally acquired funds through covert, anonymous online transactions," Richet explains in his report.
For those still confused, money laundering is an age-old method used by unsavory individuals to slip money earned illegally through various illicit means, such as crimes, back into the economy. This is achieved through various business fronts (such as cash stores and casinos) that make it hard for the authorities to follow and prosecute.
Richet points out that, although everybody knows about the old, physical placement methods of money launderers, the number of new, web-based systems is visibly growing, especially in games where in-game credits can be purchased for real currency and then transferred and transformed back into real money.
"As we spend more time and money online, opportunities for criminals to involve us in their money laundering scams will only continue to grow. This will create an increasingly difficult situation for the various law enforcement agencies that are already being put to the test by the cunning of such criminals and the myriad untraceable means they have discovered to launder illegally obtained money," concludes Richet.
The full report is available online as a PDF for those interested in further reading, thanks to the Cornell University Library.