Japan FSA asks crypto exchanges to impose withdrawal delays to fight scams
Japan’s Financial Services Agency has asked crypto exchanges to add withdrawal delays and other anti-fraud safeguards in response to increasingly sophisticated digital asset scams. The request, made jointly with the National Police Agency, aims to reduce losses from schemes where stolen or fraudulently obtained funds are moved into exchange accounts. Proposed measures include restricting withdrawals for a period after fiat deposits or crypto purchases, requiring pre-registered withdrawal addresses, and imposing a waiting period before newly added addresses can be used. Exchanges were also asked to consider customer-specific withdrawal limits, stronger monitoring of transactions and access environments, phishing-resistant multifactor authentication, and checks that bank remitter names match exchange account holders. The guidance is not mandatory; exchanges can decide how to apply it based on their own risk exposure and operations.
