A month after South Korea adopted the Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) travel rule, two solution providers VerifyVASP and CODE have linked their services on Monday to allow seamless access to exchanges for investors.
See related article: DeFi, NFT access at stake as FATF travel rule takes effect in South Korea
Fast facts
- The FATF travel rule is a set of guidelines established by the FATF that mandates crypto service providers to collect and disclose the information of parties involved in transactions worth over US$1,000.
- South Korea has made the FATF guideline a requirement for all transactions over one million Korean won (US$801.67), which went into effect on Mar. 25.
- The two travel rule solution entities are operated by four leading crypto exchange operators in the country — VerifyVASP was founded by Upbit operator Dunamu, and CODE was formed jointly by Bithumb, Coinone and Korbit.
- As the two entities were unable to connect their services in time for the rule adoption, users were unable to move large amounts of crypto from Upbit to Bithumb, Coinone and Korbit, and vice versa — a month-long problem that this system linkage solved.
- While moving crypto within local exchanges has eased, investors are still restricted from making large transfers to a set of foreign exchanges and e-wallets.
- Despite the inconvenience, experts say the ‘Travel Rule’ adoption will help improve the prevention of illegal activities and protect investors in the cryptocurrency industry.
See related article: S.Korea tosses travel rule private wallet compliance to exchanges