The European Union and eight countries signed a new treaty on crypto asset seizure and the recovery of criminal money on Wednesday 14 October 2026 in Strasbourg. The text is an additional protocol to the Council of Europe’s Warsaw Convention, and it lets authorities freeze or seize assets urgently, confiscate them in some cases without a criminal conviction, and pull data on virtual-asset accounts. Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Luxembourg, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino and the United Kingdom signed alongside the EU on day one, according to AgenceEurope and CoinGeek.
It is not in force yet. Signing is a first step: the protocol only starts to apply after five signatories, at least three of them Council of Europe member states, have ratified it, and three months have passed.
For anyone holding crypto in Europe, the interest lies in what police and prosecutors will be able to do to a wallet or an exchange account linked to a crime once it applies. Cryptocurrency is not the only subject. The text covers all criminal assets, from bank balances to property, but virtual assets are named in it explicitly, alongside bank, payment and securities accounts.
A Council of Europe treaty, not an EU law
The Council of Europe is a separate organisation from the European Union, based in Strasbourg, with 46 member states, among them the United Kingdom, Georgia, Monaco and other countries outside the EU. Its treaties bind only the states that sign and then ratify them. Nothing in this protocol applies automatically in the 27 EU countries.
The official name is the Additional Protocol to the Council of Europe Convention on Laundering, Search, Seizure and Confiscation of the Proceeds from Crime and on the Financing of Terrorism, known as the Warsaw Convention (CETS No. 198). “Warsaw Protocol” is the shorthand Bitcoin.com used in its report on 17 October.
The EU takes part as an organisation because it signed the Warsaw Convention itself on 2 April 2009, although it has never ratified it. In a proposal dated 13 July 2026 (COM(2026) 367), the European Commission asked the Council of the EU to authorise signature of the new protocol on the Union’s behalf. Member states still sign for themselves: Greece, Hungary and Luxembourg did so on 14 October.
Crypto asset seizure: what the protocol lets authorities do
The protocol has 44 articles, plus an annex that adds cybercrime to the offences listed in the Warsaw Convention’s own annex, according to the Commission’s summary. Those that matter most for crypto deal with freezing, confiscation, account registries and requests to service providers, and they become binding only for the states that ratify.
Urgent freezes, without warning the holder
“Authorities will be able to freeze or seize assets urgently, where appropriate, without prior notice,” the Council of Europe said, as quoted by CoinGeek. AgenceEurope reports the same power to act urgently and without prior notification. CoinGeek adds that requests between states must be answered within three days in urgent cases; we did not find that figure in another source.
Speed is what crypto cases lack today. Stolen or laundered coins can be moved through several wallets, bridges or exchanges in minutes, while a classic request for mutual legal assistance can take weeks. A freeze that has to be announced to the holder first often arrives after the funds are gone.
Financial Intelligence Units, the national bodies that receive suspicious-activity reports from banks and crypto platforms, also get firmer powers. Under article 10, as summarised by the Commission, they can suspend or refuse suspicious transactions, accounts and business relationships.
Confiscation without conviction, and assets held by others
Courts will be able to confiscate assets tied to wider criminal conduct, beyond the offence on trial, and in some cases without anyone being convicted. Lawyers call these extended confiscation and non-conviction-based confiscation; they are articles 3 and 4 of the protocol, according to the Commission.
Article 5 allows confiscation from third parties, meaning assets that a suspect has passed to someone else. CoinGeek notes that these provisions depend on safeguards and on how each state implements them, and article 31 sets out safeguards and legal remedies for the people affected.
Virtual-asset accounts in national registries
States will have to run a national, centralised and automated mechanism holding information on bank accounts, payment accounts, securities accounts, safe deposit boxes “and virtual-asset accounts”, the Commission writes (“comptes d’actifs virtuels” in the French version we read). In practice, investigators would be able to find out quickly whether a suspect holds an account with a crypto service provider.
Crypto is written into the definitions. Article 2 defines a “virtual asset” and a “virtual asset service provider”, the Commission document says, which Bitcoin.com also reported. Articles 20 to 22 then let one state ask another for information on accounts held with financial institutions or crypto service providers, on the transactions they carried out, and for those transactions to be monitored.
Each state will also need an asset-recovery office to trace criminal property and an asset-management office to look after what is seized. The Commission notes that the text provides for planning the management of assets and for selling them before final confiscation.
Victims are paid first, then countries split sums above €10,000
Confiscated assets go first to victims or their legitimate owners, according to CoinGeek; Bitcoin.com says affected parties have priority, and the Commission lists an article on returning assets to their former owners and compensating victims. Sums above €10,000 are, as a rule, shared equally between the countries involved, CoinGeek and Bitcoin.com report. States are encouraged to reuse confiscated assets for social purposes, a point the Commission also confirms.
Selling before confiscation matters for crypto because prices move. A seized bitcoin can lose or gain a large share of its value while a case runs for months or years. Article 15 covers such early sales and, in the Commission’s words, requires the value of the proceeds to be guaranteed.
What a state does with very large stocks of seized coins is a live question in the United Kingdom, one of the first signatories, as our coverage of the 61,000 BTC held by British authorities shows. No source links that case to this treaty.
Alain Berset, the Council of Europe’s Secretary General, put it this way, as quoted by CoinGeek: “No state can recover criminal assets across borders on its own. With this protocol, none will have to.”
The protocol in figures
| Item | Figure |
|---|---|
| Council of Europe member states | 46 |
| First signatories, 14 October 2026 | EU plus 8 states |
| Adoption by the Committee of Ministers | 15 May 2026, Chisinau (135th session) |
| Opening for signature | 14 October 2026, Strasbourg |
| Deadline for urgent requests | 3 days |
| Sharing threshold between states | Above €10,000, split equally (general rule) |
| Entry into force | 5 consents to be bound, at least 3 from member states, then 3 months |
| Warsaw Convention (CETS 198) | Adopted 16 May 2005; EU signed 2 April 2009, not ratified |
| EU states and the Convention, 18 Dec 2023 | 25 had signed, 23 had ratified (Commission count) |
Twenty years from the Warsaw Convention to Strasbourg
The Warsaw Convention was adopted on 16 May 2005 and built on the 1990 Strasbourg Convention on money laundering (CETS 141).
In 2023 the Council of Europe created an expert committee, the PC-RAC, to draft an additional protocol. The Council of the EU gave the Commission a mandate to negotiate on 13 June 2024, and seven negotiating sessions followed between May 2024 and December 2025, the Commission document says. The European Committee on Crime Problems (CDPC) approved the draft on 25 November 2025, and the Parliamentary Assembly gave its opinion on 23 April 2026.
The Committee of Ministers adopted the protocol at its 135th session in Chisinau on 15 May 2026 and agreed to open it for signature on 14 October. The ceremony took place on the sidelines of the Octopus conference on cybercrime, held in Strasbourg from 14 to 16 October.
Who signed, and what comes next
Three outlets, AgenceEurope, CoinGeek and Bitcoin.com, give the same list of eight countries besides the EU: Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Luxembourg, Monaco, Montenegro, San Marino and the United Kingdom. A Council of Europe post cited by CoinGeek said “Eight member states and the EU have signed.” CoinGeek also wrote that the EU’s 27 member states followed, which the other reports do not say and which does not match the named list.
France and Italy are not among the first signatories. The treaty remains open for signature, so either country can sign later, and we will update this piece if the Council of Europe’s official signature chart shows new names.
Ratification is the next step and the one that counts. Under article 38(1), the protocol enters into force on the first day of the month after a three-month period that starts once five signatories, at least three of them Council of Europe member states, have agreed to be bound. No ratification had been reported by 18 October, and no date for entry into force has been announced.
On the EU side, the Commission has announced further proposals so that the Union can conclude both the protocol and the Warsaw Convention itself.
What it changes for holders and crypto platforms
For an ordinary user with no link to crime, nothing changes today. The protocol is not in force, and it targets the proceeds of crime, not crypto ownership.
Once it applies, the practical effect will be faster cooperation. A prosecutor in one signatory country will be able to ask another to freeze an exchange balance and expect an answer within days, not weeks. Account registries that include virtual-asset accounts will make it easier to find where a suspect holds crypto, which relies on the identity checks platforms already run (see our glossary entry on KYC).
Exchanges and custodians in the EU already carry anti-money-laundering duties under MiCA and the Transfer of Funds rules, explained in our guide to the MiCA regulation. The Commission states that the protocol is compatible with the EU’s sixth anti-money-laundering directive (Directive 2024/1640), which applies from 10 July 2027, and with Directive 2024/1260 on asset recovery and confiscation. For EU-based platforms, the new treaty adds a cross-border layer on top of rules that are already coming, including the EU anti-money-laundering regulation due in 2027.
Self-custody wallets are a different matter. A freeze order can reach a platform that holds the keys, but not coins held with a private key that only the owner controls. No treaty changes that technical limit. What the protocol speeds up are the cases where an intermediary is involved.
Signing versus ratifying, in plain terms
A state that signs a Council of Europe treaty says it intends to be bound. It is bound only after ratification, usually a vote in its parliament, followed by the deposit of an official instrument in Strasbourg. Until enough states have done this, the protocol is a text with no legal effect.
Non-conviction confiscation means a court can order assets taken because it is shown they come from crime, even when the owner is not convicted, for example because the suspect has fled or died. Each state sets the precise cases in its own law, and the protocol requires safeguards and legal remedies for those affected.
The next dates to watch are the first ratifications, further signatures, the Council of the EU’s decision on the Union’s signature and 10 July 2027, when the EU’s sixth anti-money-laundering directive applies.
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