Can I call the police if my virtual currency is stolen?

Today, two parties consulted Lawyer Liu about their virtual currency being stolen. Both of them went to the local police station to report the case. Unsurprisingly, the police refused to accept the case on the grounds that virtual currency is not protected by the state.

"Virtual currency transactions are illegal and prohibited by the state. How dare you call the police?" - This is what one of the parties told me about the police officer who received her. I have written an article before, analyzing that the attitude of some local grassroots public security organs towards virtual currency is not in line with the current national policy regulations on virtual currency supervision. However, the reality is so helpless. It has been more than ten years since the birth of mainstream virtual currency. At present, there have been a large number of cases filed, prosecuted, and sentenced by judicial organs due to the theft/fraud of the victim's virtual currency. However, there are still some public security organs, especially grassroots public security organs, that do not protect the property rights and interests of legal virtual currency holders. Therefore, it is still necessary to write a popular law article to carry out legal "evangelism" activities.

Let me first state the conclusion: after virtual currency is stolen, the victim can report it to the police. If the conditions for filing a case are met, the public security organs should also accept and file the case. The reasons are as follows:

1. Virtual currency has property attributes

As early as 2013, the five ministries’ “Notice on Preventing Bitcoin Risks” evaluated the nature of virtual currency (represented by Bitcoin): “Bitcoin should be a specific virtual commodity.” Since it is a commodity (whether physical or virtual), it must have property attributes or property value.

For virtual currencies such as QQ coins or game coins (or game equipment) before Bitcoin, the public security organs can file a case if they are stolen, defrauded, or robbed; then, for mainstream virtual currencies with a higher degree of consensus and when relevant state ministries have given a clear characterization, they should be recognized as having property value.

Citizens should receive judicial relief when their legally held virtual currency is infringed.

2. my country does not prohibit citizens from investing in virtual currencies

Although this view is controversial at present, especially some judicial or administrative agencies believe that my country strictly prohibits anyone from investing in or trading virtual currencies. However, if we carefully study the current regulatory policies on virtual currencies in mainland my country, we cannot find any regulations that prohibit citizens from investing in virtual currencies.

Take the most authoritative "9.24 Notice" at present, "Notice on Further Preventing and Dealing with the Risks of Virtual Currency Trading Speculation", the fourth paragraph of the first article only stipulates that "there are legal risks in participating in virtual currency investment and trading activities". If citizens invest in virtual currency and its derivatives, "if it violates public order and good morals, the relevant civil legal acts will be invalid, and the losses caused thereby shall be borne by themselves."

What is "public order and good morals"? Simply put, it refers to public order and good morals. Virtual currency investment does not involve good morals. It mainly depends on whether the investment in virtual currency will violate public order, mainly financial order. In fact, the investment volume of virtual currency by ordinary citizens is unlikely to directly affect the country's financial order. However, in practice, civil disputes arising from investment in virtual currency, even if it is a small volume, are basically not accepted by the current courts.

So, even if the civil legal act is invalid, it does not mean that the country prohibits virtual currency investment. The "9.24 Notice" only reminds that there are legal risks in virtual currency transactions. More importantly, the losses caused by investing in virtual currency are borne by the risk.

However, in the case of virtual currency theft, the victim is not trading with the thief, but simply having his legal property stolen. In the case that the state does not prohibit citizens from purchasing and holding virtual currency, stealing other people's virtual currency is of course a criminal act.

3. The courts have a large number of precedents to support

In cases of virtual currency theft, there are already many cases with effective court judgments to support the case, proving that public security organs should accept and file virtual currency theft cases that meet the conditions for filing a case.

In practice, when a victim’s virtual currency is stolen, some courts convict and sentence the victim for the crime of illegally obtaining computer information system data; some courts charge the crime as theft, and the amount determined is based on the amount the victim paid for the stolen virtual currency (in this case, the virtual currency appreciates in value after being stolen; if it depreciates, there will be a lot of controversy over the amount of theft).

IV. Victims’ Guide to Reporting Crimes

For victims, at least the following steps should be taken before reporting the case to the police:

First, collect evidence that you legally own the stolen virtual currency. If you purchased it on an exchange, take screenshots of the purchase records (such as chat records with U merchants), RMB transfer records, virtual currency transfer records, and virtual currency exchange records (if any), etc., and print them out if you have purchased it from friends or even netizens. Take screenshots of the chat records and save them if you have, and print them out if you have;

The second is the on-chain path of the stolen virtual currency, which addresses it flowed through after being stolen from your wallet, and the evidence of which address it finally ended up in;

Third, pay attention to whether your wallet private key, mnemonic phrase, mobile phone, etc. have been leaked or accessed by others;

In addition, those who have the conditions can also hire a blockchain security team to investigate and track and help identify possible suspects. In this way, the probability of the public security filing a case will be greatly increased.