In a bid to protect people from potential risks in cryptocurrency transactions, a South Korean lawmaker is drafting a set of bills to give cryptocurrencies legal grounds in the country, Korea Herald reported.

In a statement, Rep. Park Yong-jin of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea said that he would introduce three revisions this month to build a regulatory framework for digital currencies such as bitcoin and Ethereum.

One of the measures aims to revise the Electronic Financial Transactions Act. If approved, it will require traders, brokers, or other business entities involved in cryptocurrency transactions to get regulatory approval from the Financial Services Commission, as well as retention of capital of at least 500 million won ($436,300) and data processing facilities.

In addition, efforts are also being made to address tax evasion from digital currency transactions which will be included in the revisions to the laws on income tax and corporate tax.

Park cited the need to address “the void of a state-led protection that guarantees digital currency’s value,” “digital currency’s non-exchangablilty to other existing currencies” and “the possibility of wreaking havoc on national economy from digital currency bubble burst" (as quoted by Korea Herald).

According to data from Coinass, bitcoin worth 1.92 trillion won has been traded for the past two years, with the number of bitcoin transactions rising by 17.1 percent in 2016 from 2015. Park pointed out that local cryptocurrency transactions are still not tracked completely, highlighting the need for governmental control.

Park and the Financial Supervisory Service also noted that domestic cryptocurrency trading platforms, including Bithumb, Korbit, and Coinone, do not have legal grounds for their establishment.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are increasingly attracting investor interest with the recent surge in their prices. BTC/USD hit an all-time high of 2980 levels (Bitstamp) last month. Ether price also hit an all-time high at 417 levels (BTC-e) on June 12.

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