One of the biggest frauds has been surfaced by the US authorities recently. The couple, Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan were arrested trying to launder $4.5 billion in Bitcoins that was stolen from the Bitfinex exchange in 2016. The department of Justice has recovered $3.5 billion of the funds, which makes it the largest recovery to date. At the time, the stolen Bitcoins weren’t worth that much, but due to the recent surge in its price, the value of the theft has skyrocketed.
What happened?
The court filings suggest that the couple tried to launder around 119,754 Bitcoins which were worth nearly $5 billion. These coins were stolen from the Bitfinex exchange after they suffered a security breach in 2016. The authorities were able to identify them as the hacker after making thousands of unauthorized transactions sent the coins to Ilya Lichtenstein’s wallet. The authorities were almost sure that Ilya and Heather were behind this, and they had been trying to launder these coins for quite some time.
Ilya Lichtenstein, a tech entrepreneur and Y combinator alum.
Heather Morgan, a Forbes columnist.
Today they were arrested for trying to launder billions in stolen crypto. They face up to 20 years in prison. pic.twitter.com/iUNRJDfVfL
— Fintwit (@fintwit_news) February 8, 2022
The couple used many programs and created fake identities to automate transactions. Then they tried to put about 25,000 Bitcoins in their accounts without getting noticed. After the allegation, the authorities asked for a search warrant from the court, which they easily got. And on searching the couple’s accounts and files, they discovered private keys to 94,000 Bitcoins which were about $3.6 billion of the funds. The couple were then arrested and have been charged with conspiracy and money laundering. They will face a maximum of 20 years of sentence in prison.
The case shows that it’s not that easy to launder cryptocurrency that’s being stolen from exchanges or other platforms. “Criminals always leave tracks, and today’s case is a reminder that the FBI has the tools to follow the digital trail, wherever it may lead,” said FBI Deputy Director Paul M. Abbate.
What are your thoughts as the couple gets arrested trying to launder stolen Bitcoins worth $4.5B? And do you think this will show that crypto can’t be misused by criminals so easily? Let us know in the comments below. Also, if you found our content informative, do like and share it with your friends.
Also Read: Russian authorities might collect $13 billion in taxes from crypto regulation every year.
