Question 1

What is ShieldScan?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan is an AML (Anti-Money Laundering) compliance platform built specifically for the Ethereum blockchain. It lets users, exchanges, and institutions check whether an Ethereum wallet address or transaction has exposure to illicit activity such as sanctions, darknet markets, mixers, and ransomware.

Question 2

Who should use ShieldScan?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan is designed for crypto exchanges, payment processors, DeFi protocols, compliance officers, financial investigators, and individual traders who want to verify the risk profile of wallets they interact with.

Question 3

Which blockchains does ShieldScan support?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan currently focuses on the Ethereum blockchain (ETH and all ERC-20 tokens). Support for BSC and other EVM-compatible chains is on our roadmap for 2025.

Question 4

How is the risk score calculated?

Accepted Answer

Risk scores are derived from a multi-layer analysis: direct exposure (funds sent/received from known illicit addresses), indirect exposure (graph traversal up to 10 hops), cluster-level entity labeling, and a machine-learning classifier trained on investigator-labeled heuristics. Scores range from 0 (no risk) to 100 (critical risk).

Question 5

What does 'indirect exposure' mean?

Accepted Answer

Indirect exposure measures whether a wallet received funds that passed through illicit addresses several hops upstream. For example, if Wallet A sent funds to Wallet B, and Wallet B then sent funds to your wallet (Wallet C), your wallet has 2-hop indirect exposure to Wallet A's risk.

Question 6

How often is your data updated?

Accepted Answer

Sanctions lists (OFAC, UN, EU) are refreshed within minutes of publication. On-chain transaction data is indexed in near real-time as new Ethereum blocks are produced (approximately every 12 seconds). Risk model updates are deployed weekly.

Question 7

What is the API response time?

Accepted Answer

Standard wallet scans return results in under 500 ms for 95th-percentile requests. Complex deep-hop analysis may take up to 2 seconds for heavily-connected addresses.

Question 8

Is there a free plan?

Accepted Answer

Yes. The Starter plan is permanently free and includes 100 wallet scans per month, OFAC sanctions checks, basic risk scoring, and REST API access — no credit card required.

Question 9

What happens if I exceed my monthly scan quota?

Accepted Answer

On the Starter plan, additional scans are blocked until the next billing cycle. On paid plans, you can enable overage billing at a per-scan rate, or upgrade your plan. We always notify you at 80% and 100% of your quota.

Question 10

Do you offer annual billing discounts?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Annual plans are billed at 10 months' price (equivalent to 2 months free). Annual plans also include priority onboarding and a dedicated compliance consultation session.

Question 11

Do you store the addresses I scan?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan logs API requests for billing, abuse prevention, and audit purposes. Addresses submitted for scanning are retained for 90 days on Starter and Professional plans, and indefinitely on Enterprise plans with full audit trail export. We never sell individual query data to third parties.

Question 12

Is ShieldScan SOC 2 compliant?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan is currently undergoing SOC 2 Type II certification. Our infrastructure is hosted on ISO 27001-certified cloud providers, all data is encrypted in transit (TLS 1.3) and at rest (AES-256), and access controls follow the principle of least privilege.

Question 13

Can I use ShieldScan to meet FATF Travel Rule requirements?

Accepted Answer

ShieldScan's risk scoring and wallet screening data can be used as part of a Travel Rule compliance workflow. We integrate with leading Travel Rule solution providers. However, ShieldScan itself is not a Travel Rule messaging solution — please contact sales for integration guidance.

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