India’s Enforcement Directorate (ED) says it has frozen greater than 77.6 bitcoins that have been transferred to Binance from Indian crypto change Wazirx. The freeze is a part of a cash laundering investigation right into a cellular gaming utility.
India’s Directorate of Enforcement (ED) introduced Wednesday that it has frozen 77.62710139 bitcoins below the nation’s Prevention of Cash Laundering Act (PMLA). The ED is the Indian authorities’s regulation enforcement and financial intelligence company.
The freeze is a part of the ED’s investigation right into a cellular gaming utility known as E-nuggets. In response to the announcement, the cryptocurrency was transferred from Wazirx, a well-liked Indian change, to Binance. The ED additionally tweeted a abstract of its motion.
The regulation enforcement company defined that “Aamir Khan, S/o Nesar Ahmed Khan launched a cellular gaming utility specifically E-Nuggets, which was designed for the aim of defrauding [the] public,” including:
After amassing seizable sum of money from the general public, abruptly withdrawal from the stated app was stopped on one pretext or the opposite. Thereafter, all knowledge together with profile info was wiped off from the stated app servers.
The ED defined that its investigations have revealed that the accused transferred a part of the illegally earned funds abroad by way of the Indian crypto change Wazirx.
The accused allegedly opened a dummy account within the identify of “Sima Naskar (Proprietor of M/s Pixal Design)” with Wazirx and used it to buy cryptocurrencies, the ED additional described, elaborating:
Thereafter the stated crypto currencies have been additional transferred to a different account in one other crypto change, specifically Binance.
“The stability of stated transferred cryptocurrencies i.e. 77.62710139 bitcoins [equivalent to USD 1,573,466 (Rs 12.83 crore approximately)] at Binance crypto change has been freezed,” the ED wrote.
Binance was believed to have acquired Wazirx in 2019. Nonetheless, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) just lately stated that the acquisition “was by no means accomplished,” emphasizing that “Binance has by no means — at any level — owned any shares of Zanmai Labs, the entity working Wazirx.”
The ED froze the financial institution property of Wazirx price greater than $8 million in August. Nonetheless, earlier this month, Wazirx stated that its financial institution accounts have been unfrozen. Following Wazirx, the ED froze crypto and financial institution property price $46 million of Vauld, a crypto platform backed by Peter Thiel. In August, the company searched crypto change Coinswitch Kuber. Nonetheless, the CEO of the change stated that it was not associated to cash laundering investigations.
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Scammers are exploiting the rising popularity of Telegram and its associated cryptocurrency, Toncoin (TON), to execute a highly scalable scheme design to pilfer the digital tokens from unsuspecting users. Kaspersky researchers have discovered the operation, which has been active since November 2023, and warns that it is a growing threat.
Victims are being lured into the scheme via an invitation to join an “exclusive earning program” received from a contact in their list. The invitation leads them to an unofficial Telegram bot, falsely touted as a cryptocurrency storage solution. The victims are then instructed to link it to a legitimate wallet and to buy Toncoins through official channels such as the official Telegram bot or through cryptocurrency exchanges.
After duping victims into purchasing the coins, scammers push them to buy so-called ‘boosters’ using a separate bot, stating that this is the step needed to commence earning. The ‘boosters’, likened to those seen in online games, are misleadingly marketed as tools that allow users to capitalise on their coins further. “This scheme resembles boosters in online games – by purchasing one, the user gains additional advantages,” explains Olga Svistunova, Senior Web Content Analyst at Kaspersky. Once bought these ‘boosters’ cost victims their cryptocurrency, and the money lost is irreversible.
Following the purchase of the scam ‘boosters’, users are manipulated into propagating the scheme. They are encouraged to create a private Telegram group with their friends and acquaintances, share a specially generated referral link and a video with instructions on earnings. The scammers claim that at least five people should join the private group via the referral link before a victim can start earning. They are also told that they will receive payment for each friend invited and will make a commission from each of the fraudulent ‘boosters’ purchased by those they have referred.
Alluding to the potential scale of the scam, the Telegram Open Network (TON) was developed by the Durov brothers and is now backed by an independent community. Telegram itself has reached 900 million monthly users and ranks globally as the 6th most used and 6th most downloaded app. This expansive user base increases both the potential pool of victims and the likely impacts of the scheme.
Kaspersky experts have urged all users to exercise caution when encountering offers of quick riches, even if they are received from friends or acquaintances. Avoid transferring cryptocurrency to unknown or suspicious wallets, and consider comprehensive protection for your digital assets, such as Kaspersky Premium which alerts you to suspicious websites and guards your wallet against scammers, miners and other threats. Staying updated and informed about the latest fraudulent schemes is another effective protective measure.
Keonne Rodriguez and William Lonergan Hill have been charged by the U.S. Department of Justice for laundering more than $100 million from various criminal enterprises through Samourai, a cryptocurrency mixer service they ran for nearly a decade.
As detailed in a superseding indictment, criminals also used Samourai’s Whirlpool crypto mixer to process over $2 billion in illicit funds between 2015 and February 2024.
In addition to crypto mixing services, Samourai also offered a service called “Ricochet,” which allowed users to send cryptocurrency using additional and unnecessary intermediate transactions to thwart law enforcement and crypto exchange efforts to track funds sourced from criminal activity.
This money laundering activity allegedly earned the two founders around $4.5 million in fees for Whirlpool and Ricochet transactions.
“Since the start of the Whirlpool service in or about 2019, and of the Ricochet service in or about 2017, over 80,000 BTC (worth over $2 billion applying the BTC-USD conversion rates at the time of each transaction) has passed through these two services operated by Samourai,” the indictment alleges.
Samourai’s Wallet mobile application was also downloaded over 100,000 times, allowing users to store private keys for BTC addresses they controlled and exchange funds with other Samourai users in anonymous financial transactions.
Icelandic law enforcement has seized Samourai’s domains (samourai[.]io and samouraiwallet[.]com) and web servers, and the Google Play Store removed the Android mobile app after being served a seizure warrant.
Rodriguez was taken into custody this morning and will appear before a U.S. Magistrate Judge in the Western District of Pennsylvania in the following days.
Hill was also arrested this morning in Portugal on U.S. criminal charges, with the U.S. government planning to request his extradition to the United States so that he can stand trial.
They’re both charged with two counts of conspiracy: money laundering (20-year maximum sentence) and operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business (5-year maximum sentence).
“While offering Samourai as a ‘privacy’ service, the defendants knew that it was a haven for criminals to engage in large-scale money laundering and sanctions evasion,” the DOJ said.
“Samourai laundered over $100 million of crime proceeds originating from, among other criminal sources, illegal dark web markets, such as Silk Road and Hydra Market; various wire fraud and computer fraud schemes, including a web-server intrusion, a spearphishing scheme, and schemes to defraud multiple decentralized finance protocols; and other illegal
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