In brief
- The IRGC has promoted Hormuz Safe, a platform that settles shipping insurance payments in Bitcoin, per state media reports.
- Europol has flagged 14,200 IRGC-linked posts across social media and websites.
- Sanctions, tracing and weak insurer support could limit use, Decrypt was told.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps has reportedly promoted Hormuz Safe, a Bitcoin-settled maritime insurance platform for cargo crossing the Strait of Hormuz, under a broader model Iran’s Economy Ministry has explored for the strategic oil transit route.
Fars, a state-affiliated Iranian news agency, reported Saturday that Iran’s Economy Ministry had been exploring the model since late April, with the plan allowing marine insurance policies and financial responsibility certificates that could generate more than $10 billion for the country.
The platform’s rules say it provides “fast and cryptographically verifiable insurance policies” for cargo moving through the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and surrounding waterways, with payments “settled in Bitcoin” and coverage beginning from the moment of confirmation, per the report.
Over a month ago, Iranian officials reportedly sought Bitcoin payments from oil tankers seeking passage through the Strait of Hormuz, saying the fees would be harder to trace or seize under sanctions. That proposal was later followed by reports of scammers impersonating Iranian authorities and demanding Bitcoin or USDT from ships seeking transit clearance through the strait.
On Myriad, a prediction market owned by Decrypt’s parent company Dastan, traders placed the likelihood of a Trump announcement ending the Hormuz blockade before June at 20%. Users also gave Iran’s regime a 12% chance of falling before October.
A separate market places the odds of Iran closing its airspace before June at 46.5%.
Possible, but difficult
Observers say the reported model may be technically possible, though difficult to scale beyond sanctioned or niche trade channels.
Bitcoin-settled insurance is possible in “niche, sanctioned-trade workarounds,” but is not practical for mainstream shipping due to sanctions risk, volatility, limited legal recognition and lack of insurer support, Dominick John, an analyst at Zeus Research, told Decrypt.
While Bitcoin “helps route around sanctions,” it remains “a limited solution” because liquidity limits, traceability and fiat off-ramps still create exposure, John said. Crypto also “does not solve” counterparty trust or enforceable reinsurance, he added.
The platform’s technical and legal viability is “highly doubtful,” with no confirmed users despite its reported launch, Ryan Yoon, senior analyst at Tiger Research, told Decrypt. The lack of visible users likely reflects U.S. secondary sanctions risk, with any shipping company using Hormuz Safe facing “immediate expulsion from the global financial system,” he added.
Bitcoin’s transparency could also make the model easier to monitor.
Transactions recorded on Bitcoin’s ledger are public, meaning Iran-linked wallet addresses would be exposed and related coins could become “tainted,” Agne Linge, a board advisor to Wefi, told Decrypt. Blockchain analytics firms would likely flag those flows, even if payments move faster than through banking networks Iran struggles to access, she added.
The reports come as European authorities target IRGC-linked online activity. Europol announced Monday that investigators identified 14,200 links tied to what it called the group’s propaganda ecosystem.
That takedown shows how state-linked actors rely on “interconnected digital infrastructure” instead of isolated accounts or websites, Andy Yajin Zhou, associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and co-founder of on-chain security firm BlockSec, told Decrypt.
Such networks can combine social media, hosting, messaging platforms and crypto payment channels, so investigators often look beyond posts to the wider system behind them, Zhou said.
Crypto payments can provide “useful investigative signals” because public blockchains let investigators trace fund flows, wallet clusters and links to exchanges or OTC networks, Zhou said. Still, blockchain data alone is usually “insufficient for definitive attribution,” since sophisticated actors can use one-time wallets, mixers or informal settlement channels to reduce traceability, he added.
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