Willful and non-willful tax flubs are different. Taxes are complex, and innocent tax mistakes can often be forgiven — maybe with no penalty. Even if there is a penalty, non-willful is vastly lower than willful. In a criminal tax case, this fundamental dichotomy can mean the difference between innocence or guilt, freedom or incarceration. But penalties in civil cases can be plenty bad — and most tax cases are civil — and to the United States Internal Revenue Service, bad intent may not be bad at all.
With crypto, the IRS has said it is digging hard, investigating both tax evasion and just poor compliance. But any interaction with the IRS can routinely involve some kind of penalty. Sometimes, the IRS uses the threat of penalties to encourage payments. But in other cases, the IRS pursues penalties with a vengeance.