Author: Gao Mingcun, Ji Meng; Source: W3C DAO

Recently, the People's Court Newspaper published "Illegal The article "Criminal Legal Characteristics of Stealing Virtual Currency" points out that stealing virtual currency constitutes the crime of theft.

It is mentioned in the article that as economic property, it must have value, including utility, scarcity and disposability.

Scarcity is reflected in the fact that the total amount of virtual currency is constant, and the supply is not unlimited. Disposability is reflected in the fact that virtual currency uses asymmetric encryption technology, which is stored in a "wallet" (i.e. address). After obtaining the address and private key, the virtual currency can be controlled.

Utility is reflected in the fact that virtual currency, as a specific data encoding, must be generated through "mining", and "mining" condenses social abstract labor.

In real life, virtual currency can be transferred and traded to obtain calculable economic benefits, and has use value and exchange value. Therefore, virtual currency has property attributes.

Theft of virtual currency constitutes the crime of illegally obtaining computer system data. "Data" is defined as "any electronic or other record of information."

Virtual currency is produced and exists in computer networks. In terms of technical attributes, it is a string of digital combinations that exist in electronic form and has the criminal law attributes of computer information system data. Virtual currency is of data nature, and the act of illegally stealing virtual currency constitutes the crime of illegally obtaining computer system data.

It is determined that the theft of virtual currency is a crime of illegally obtaining computer system data and the crime of theft. After the competition, we faced the issue of how to calculate the value of the virtual currency involved.

Since the price of virtual currency changes at any time, in practice, the principles of fairness, reasonableness and convenience should be followed for objective determination. Since virtual currency is regarded as property and illegal possession of other people’s virtual currency constitutes a property crime, the amount of the victim’s loss is used as the amount involved, which is in line with the basic principles of calculating the amount of property crime.

However, due to the relationship between supply and demand and artificial speculation factors of virtual currency, its price will show a large increase or depreciation. Therefore, it is more reasonable to calculate the amount of virtual currency involved when the defendant commits the crime rather than when the victim purchases the virtual currency. .

But at the same time, the article also mentioned that the "Notice on Further Preventing and Handling the Risks of Speculation in Virtual Currency Transactions" issued on September 15, 2021 clearly stipulates that virtual currencies do not have the same legal status as legal tender. Currency-related business activities are illegal financial activities, and the resulting losses shall be borne by the parties themselves.

However, the author believes that whether it is protected by law is not necessarily related to whether it has property attributes. The relevant regulations only deny its legal currency status, but do not deny the property attributes of virtual currency.

Previously, the People's Court newspaper published an article "Identification of Property Attributes of Virtual Currency and Issues Disposal of Property Involved in Cases".

The article even analyzes the criminal law attributes of virtual currencies, saying that virtual currencies have economic attributes and can be classified as property. The current law does not classify virtual currencies as illegal items. Therefore, under the current legal framework, my country The virtual currency held by relevant entities is still legal property and is protected by law.

The article recommends that the money and property involved in the case should be handled from a basic standpoint of legality. The author believes that for criminal acts involving virtual currency, the money and property involved in the case cannot be confiscated or returned, and should be based on the unified order of criminal and civil laws. , be treated separately to achieve balanced protection of personal property rights and social public interests.

In practice, there are several types of opinions on the identification of the criminal law attributes of virtual currencies:< /p>

The first opinion is that virtual currency is just electronic data stored in a computer system. It is now circulated in my country's "black market" as illegal currency, and most of it serves as a means of payment for illegal crimes and a medium for illegal entry of overseas funds." The role of "black and gray" should not be recognized as property in the sense of criminal law in the absence of express provisions of the law.

The second opinion is that virtual currency is a virtual commodity and has property value, and judging from the judicial interpretation of theft and robbery of drugs and other contraband, it is alsoVirtual currency should be recognized as property within the meaning of criminal law. However, given that my country currently prohibits the circulation of virtual currencies, it is not appropriate to recognize them as legal property and protect them.

The third opinion is that virtual currency is property in the sense of criminal law and is legal property unless it is used by the holder to commit a crime or directly. Otherwise, the property rights and interests of virtual currency holders should be protected.