Why Deconfliction Is a Safety Issue — Not Just an Efficiency Problem

Key takeaways

• Deconfliction is a safety issue, not just an efficiency one. When agencies unknowingly work the same target, the risk isn't wasted effort — it's operational conflict, compromised undercover operations, and investigations that collapse before they close.
• Crypto crime is global; investigations often aren't. Pig butchering scams, ransomware, and other crypto-enabled crimes target victims across dozens of countries simultaneously. The agencies investigating them frequently don't know about each other.
• Every delay is a missed window. The anonymous nature of cryptocurrency means investigators may not realize another team is working the same case — and by the time they do, funds have moved and opportunities to seize them are gone.
• Access to a deconfliction network shouldn't depend on seniority or connections. State and local agencies are often working with fewer tools and smaller networks than their federal counterparts; shared infrastructure helps level the playing field.
• TRM Deconflict is free for any verified law enforcement officer worldwide, regardless of whether their agency uses TRM's paid products. More than 500 agencies are already using it to coordinate on over 8,500 deconfliction events each month.

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When two agencies unknowingly work the same crypto case, the problem isn't just duplicated effort. In undercover-intensive operations, it's a safety risk: one agency moves on a target while another has an embedded officer in the field. In time-sensitive fraud cases, this overlap — unbeknownst to the disparate teams — can mean the difference between seizing funds and watching them move out of reach.

Chris Janczewski (TRM's Head of Global Investigations) knows this firsthand. He spent 13 years as a special agent with IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) before joining TRM Labs. In that time, he saw what happens when agencies work in silos — and what becomes possible when they don't.

Deconfliction isn't a workflow optimization. It's a fundamental operational requirement — and in crypto investigations, one that's harder to get right than it sounds.

The risks go beyond wasted effort

Most conversations about deconfliction focus on efficiency: preventing duplicate subpoenas, avoiding redundant victim outreach, not spending weeks on a case someone else already cracked. Those are real costs. But they undersell the problem.

The more serious risk is operational. Janczewski points to a scenario investigators encounter more often than they'd like: you're conducting an operation, and you find out another agency already had an undercover officer working the same target. Or the inverse — you discover that a different team is significantly further along in the same investigation and could have been a collaborator all along.

Both situations represent missed opportunities. The first is a safety risk. The second is a waste of resources that most agencies can't afford. In either case, the root cause is the same: no system to surface conflicts and connections before they become problems.

Crypto makes coordination harder — and more necessary

Traditional case deconfliction is complicated enough — crypto adds even more nuance.

Cryptocurrency crime is global by default. A pig butchering scam targeting victims in the United States is running the same playbook on victims in South Korea, Singapore, and dozens of other countries at the same time. Romance scam operators, ransomware groups, and darknet market actors don't organize themselves around jurisdictions. 

These criminal networks don't face the same bureaucratic and geographic constraints that investigators do.

That asymmetry matters. A detective and a federal agent may be tracing the same wallet — each unaware of the other. A law enforcement team abroad may have already built the case that a domestic team is just starting. And unlike traditional financial crimes, the anonymous nature of cryptocurrency makes it much harder to know who else is working a given target.

Every delay in action is a missed opportunity: funds that could be seized, assets that could be returned to victims, suspects who keep operating. As Janczewski puts it, bad actors aren't selective about the location of their victims — and they're not hindered by the same bureaucracies and jurisdictions that investigators are.

Not every agency has the same starting point

There's another dimension to this that Janczewski is direct about: not every investigator is working from the same position.

Agencies vary significantly in their access to blockchain intelligence tools, their professional networks, and their institutional knowledge of how crypto investigations work across jurisdictions. Federal agencies often have relationships and resources that state and local departments don't. That disparity creates uneven outcomes — not because investigators at smaller agencies are less capable, but because they're working with less.

Deconfliction infrastructure helps close that gap. When investigators across every level of law enforcement — local, state, federal, and international — can identify overlapping cases and connect with verified peers, the entire network gets stronger. Resources go further. Cases that would otherwise stall find paths forward.

What good deconfliction produces in practice

When it works, deconfliction produces several outcomes that matter to investigators:

• Preventing blue-on-blue conflicts: Knowing that another agency is already working a target before you make a move changes the calculus entirely — and can prevent real harm.
• Accelerating cases through collaboration: If another team is further along in an investigation, connecting with them means access to leads, evidence context, and intelligence that can compress months of work. Sharing resources doesn't dilute cases; it strengthens them.
• Enabling coordinated action: Joint operations, coordinated seizures, and parallel prosecutions across jurisdictions all start with a simple question: who else is working this?

TRM Deconflict is built specifically to answer that question. It's a free platform available to any verified law enforcement agency worldwide — regardless of whether they're an existing TRM customer. 

Investigators can check wallet addresses, flag investigative interest, and surface connections to other agencies working the same targets, all within a secure, law-enforcement-only environment. More than 500 agencies currently use TRM Deconflict’s network to coordinate on over 8,500 deconfliction events each month.

The platform also connects to TRM Academy, giving agencies without deep crypto expertise — or those looking to take their crypto tracing skills even further — access to training resources alongside TRM’s intelligence tools.

A network that works for every investigator

Investigators need a faster, more reliable way to find each other and act — without relying on personal networks or prior relationships to do it. TRM Deconflict was built for exactly that — and it's free to access. If you're a verified law enforcement officer, you can request access here.

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Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

1. What is deconfliction in crypto investigations? 

Deconfliction is the process of identifying when multiple agencies are working the same target — whether that's a wallet address, a suspect, or a broader scheme — and coordinating to avoid operational conflict, duplication of effort, or missed opportunities. In crypto investigations, deconfliction is especially challenging because the pseudonymous nature of blockchain activity makes it difficult to know who else may be tracing the same funds.

2. Who can use TRM Deconflict? 

TRM Deconflict is available to verified law enforcement professionals at any level — local, state, federal, and international. Eligibility requires an official agency email address, which TRM uses to verify law enforcement status before granting access. You don't need to be an existing TRM customer.

3. Is TRM Deconflict free? 

Yes. TRM Deconflict is completely free for verified law enforcement. TRM built it as a public good for the investigative community — the goal is to get as many verified investigators on the same network as possible, regardless of their agency's budget.

4. How does TRM Deconflict protect operational security? 

TRM Deconflict is a closed, law-enforcement-only environment. Investigators flag interest in wallet addresses without automatically exposing their case details to anyone else. When two agencies are working the same target, TRM facilitates a connection — but only with explicit consent from both sides. Case intelligence stays with the agencies; TRM connects the investigators, not the case files.

5. Does deconfliction only matter for large-scale or federal investigations? 

No — and this is a common misconception. State and local investigators increasingly encounter crypto as a component of drug cases, fraud, and theft investigations, often without realizing that a federal agency or international partner may already be building a case on the same target. Deconfliction matters at every level, and the risk of operational conflict doesn't scale with agency size.

6. How do I get access to TRM Deconflict? 

Submit a request at trmlabs.com/blockchain-intelligence-platform/deconflict using your official agency email address. TRM will verify your law enforcement status and grant access.