概要
- A shadow market is helping Chinese users sidestep U.S. AI export controls. Proxy services provide access to restricted frontier models, enabling Chinese companies to distill advanced American AI capabilities into their own systems at a fraction of the training cost.
- Crypto is helping facilitate the market. Chainalysis research examines the proxy ecosystem’s evolving supply chain and payment infrastructure, finding that 40% of proxy services surveyed accepted cryptocurrency as payment, predominantly stablecoins.
- Chinese-linked wallet activity spikes after frontier AI releases. Our research also found that payments from suspected Chinese-linked wallets rise above normal levels in the days following new U.S. model launches, suggesting efforts to quickly access new capabilities, though the data cannot confirm the cause.
Developing frontier AI models is a resource-intensive process with national security implications. For that reason, the U.S. government bars users and companies in China—a key competitor in the global AI arms race—from accessing powerful AI tools like Claude and ChatGPT.
Research and analysis from the Chainalysis Global Intelligence Team found that banned suspected Chinese users are accessing models anyway. They are doing it via a shadow economy of export control-sidestepping services that sell access, often at a discount, to the restricted models. Once in, the banned users can cheaply mine the advanced models to improve their own systems for a fraction of the cost.
Called “proxy services,” these waystations route queries into AI models while concealing where those requests came from. They take payment in fiat currency, including through China-based payment processors such as WeChat and AliPay. Our survey of 100 proxy services found that 40% also accept crypto as payment, predominately in stablecoins.
The above screenshot was taken in August 2026 of one surveyed proxy domain offering crypto payment for users looking to top-up their account balances.
Crypto payments are likely part of a deliberate strategy by these proxy services to obfuscate financial infrastructure, bypass state capital controls, and maintain off-grid access for sensitive users.
Chinese AI companies use these proxy services to train their own models, undermining U.S. restrictions
By providing indirect access to advanced American models, proxy services are undermining the national security-focused restrictions that U.S.-based AI labs implement.
Through a process known as distillation, Chinese AI laboratories can use the outputs of advanced models to improve their own competing models far more cheaply than they could by training their models from scratch. Anthropic recently accused three China-based AI labs (DeepSeek, Moonshot, and MiniMax) of extracting capabilities from Claude using 24,000 fraudulent accounts run through proxy services.
And as Anthropic itself outlines, such illicitly distilled models can spread dangerous capabilities as they often lack essential safeguards. Just last month, the National Security Agency warned these models can pose significant risks to critical infrastructure, military, economic, and technology domains.
The once informal market facilitating this access has matured into a structured economy, with a segmented supply chain and dedicated financial infrastructure. Providers sell access through credits and account top-ups, creating a commercial ecosystem around unauthorized access to U.S. frontier models.
Crypto payments are gaining traction in this commercial ecosystem, offering an alternative for users looking to avoid Chinese digital payment rails.
Suspected Chinese wallet activity in the proxy economy spikes after new U.S. model releases
We analyzed suspected Chinese-linked wallet activity around major U.S. AI model releases. If Chinese developers are using proxy services to extract capabilities from new models—and using crypto to pay for these services—we would expect payments to spike after a release.
We found that suspected China-linked wallets do increase their activity in the days following a frontier model release in excess of what we see across all wallets using these services. This pattern is consistent with an effort to gain rapid access to new model capabilities, and may reflect crypto being used as a payment rail to facilitate distillation. The aggregate data cannot, however, confirm what is driving the observed activity.
User crypto payments in the ecosystem typically pass through custodial services before reaching proxy providers
Our analysis of the wallets paying for AI proxy services found a large concentration of these wallets in China, as well as in Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and South Korea, which is consistent with Chinese operators routing through regional proxy corridors to access restricted models.
Our research also found that proxy services do not always collect user payments directly. Instead, most use custodial cryptocurrency payment processors. These services can provide a range of benefits, such as adding distance between users and proxy providers, helping bypass state capital controls, and maintaining off-grid access for sensitive users.
Given China’s broad restrictions on crypto payment activities, reliance on third-party processors may also appeal to these proxy services as it reduces their exposure to the regulatory and operational risks associated with maintaining their own payment infrastructure.
This layered payment structure creates exposure for regulated crypto exchanges and other crypto companies, as funds linked to proxy services can reach regulated platforms with no clear direct ties back to the proxy services.
How blockchain intelligence can help crack down on the proxy shadow market
AI proxy services are creating a major enforcement challenge for U.S. efforts to restrict Chinese access to advanced AI. Blocking direct access to frontier models is no longer enough when a mature shadow economy now exists to resell access.
The proxy economy’s multi-tier supply chain also makes it particularly difficult to dismantle. Upstream vendors obtain model access through tactics such as account farming and model swapping; proxy services then handle both intermediary and downstream elements, including pooling access, routing queries, and selling subscriptions. When one vendor is disrupted, others can step in.
Blockchain intelligence can help investigators trace financial flows across this ecosystem, exposing links between proxy operators, their users, the operational and financial intermediaries that sustain them, and the platforms where funds ultimately land.
By mapping these connections, authorities and AI companies can identify critical pressure points, disrupt the infrastructure sustaining these networks, and thereby undermine the shadow market enabling unauthorized access to American AI.
よくある質問
What are Chinese AI proxy services?
Chinese AI proxy services are businesses that resell access to otherwise restricted AI models, such as Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini, allowing users in China and elsewhere to use systems they may not be able to access directly. Most services offer pay-as-you-go subscriptions, where sign-up is free and then users buy tokens to run queries.
Why are AI proxy services a concern for U.S. authorities and AI companies?
Beyond individual users accessing AI tools, a key concern is that Chinese AI developers may use proxy services to extract capabilities from U.S. frontier models and train their own systems without incurring the same research and development costs. These efforts circumvent U.S. AI export controls and create security risks if derivative models lack the safeguards of the original systems.
How do AI proxy services use cryptocurrency?
Cryptocurrency, particularly stablecoins, allows proxy services to accept payments without relying on traditional banking infrastructure. Crypto payments can also reduce payment friction and, depending on the transaction, limit the identity verification required of customers. Chainalysis found that 40% of 100 AI proxy services surveyed offered crypto payments.
How do AI proxy services process cryptocurrency payments?
Many appear to rely on custodial services and third-party payment processors rather than receiving payments directly from users. These intermediaries help providers create distance between customers and service operators, bypass state capital controls, and maintain off-grid access for sensitive users.
How can blockchain intelligence help investigate AI proxy networks?
Blockchain intelligence can help investigators and compliance teams trace cryptocurrency flows and map relationships among proxy operators, payment processors, and exchanges. By examining these connections across multiple transactions and services, investigators can identify potential intervention points and better understand the financial infrastructure supporting unauthorized access to advanced AI models.
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