South Korea's Paju city seizes cryptocurrency and collects 100 million won in unpaid local taxes

The city of Paju in South Korea announced on the 29th that it had seized the virtual currency of delinquent taxpayers and collected 100 million won (approximately 11.1 million yen) in overdue local taxes.
The current seizure of virtual currency is aimed at accumulated virtual currency that was concealed to avoid overdue tax collection despite the ability to pay.
This is an extreme case of collection. According to the city of Paju, after checking with those who owed more than 1 million won (about 110,000 yen) on tax arrears to see if they had accounts at cryptocurrency exchanges, 64 people were found to have cryptocurrency accounts.
It was confirmed that the group held shares in a company, which together owed a total of 650 million won (approximately 72.2 million yen) in taxes.
Paju city seized 280 million won (about 31.1 million yen) worth of virtual currency.
The company plans to collect 100 million won (approximately 11.1 million yen) in overdue payments, and also plans to collect the remaining 180 million won (approximately 20 million yen) through sales, collection, etc.
Virtual currencies have rapidly spread in recent years and are being misused by tax defaulters as a means to hide or move assets.
This case shows that delinquent taxpayers have nowhere left to hide, and the city of Paju plans to track down the hidden assets to collect the overdue amounts.
Woo Sang-hwan, head of the tax collection division, stressed the importance of paying taxes to citizens and said, "We will implement various measures to create a culture of honest tax payment."
"We plan to launch collection activities," he said, adding, "We will also provide support to those in financial difficulty who are defaulting on tax payments, such as by postponing seizure measures."