The largest seizure in history of $ 5 billion in stolen bitcoin
The media reported that the US Department of Justice exported more than $5 billion in stolen bitcoin, the largest seizure of its kind ever. Officials also arrested and charged two people on Tuesday with attempting to launder money, amounting to nearly 120,000 bitcoins.
According to the BBC, the money stolen by a hacker who hacked the cryptocurrency exchange in 2016, was estimated to be worth $71 million. But with Bitcoin on the rise, it is now valued at more than $5 billion. Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Bullitt Jr. said the seizure was evidence that the government “will not allow cryptocurrencies to be a money laundering safe haven or an area of chaos within our financial system.” The money stems from a 2016 hack of the cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex.
Also, according to US Department of Justice officials, a hacker hacked the platform, made more than 2,000 unauthorized transactions, and then transferred the funds to a digital wallet allegedly operated by Ilya Lichtenstein, from New York. A criminal complaint alleges that Liechtenstein and his wife, Heather Morgan, laundered about 25,000 stolen bitcoins through various accounts over the past five years and used various methods to cover their tracks, from fake identities to converting their bitcoins to other digital currencies.
The BBC said the Bitfinex platform said in a statement that it had cooperated with the investigation and was "delighted" to have recovered the stolen funds.
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