Founder of Bitcoin Fog Receives a 12-Year Sentence for Cryptocurrency Money Laundering
The founder of the Bitcoin Fog cryptocurrency mixing service, aged 36, saw a verdict of 12 years and six months in prison due to aiding money laundering operations from 2011 to 2021.
In an admittance this March, Roman Sterlingov, a Russian-Swedish citizen, pleaded guilty to charges involving money laundering and managing an unlicensed money transmission enterprise.
As termed by the U.S. Department of Justice (DoJ), Bitcoin Fog was labeled as the lengthiest-serving virtual currency mixer in the dark web, offering cybercriminals a method to disguise the origin of their digital currency profits.
“During its ten-year operation, Bitcoin Fog became known as a preferred money laundry service for offenders wishing to obscure their illegal earnings from law enforcement and managed dealings involving more than 1.2 million bitcoins, with an assessed worth of around $400 million at the time of transaction,” highlighted the DoJ in its statement.
“Most of this cryptocurrency originated from obscured e-commerce platforms and was affiliated with illegitimate substances, computer-based crimes, identity theft, and abusive materials involving children.”
Alongside the imprisonment, Sterlingov has been decreed to relinquish $395.56 million, in addition to confisticated digital currencies and monetary holdings assessed at about $1.76 million. Furthermore, he has been instructed to waive his stake in the Bitcoin Fog wallet, currently storing 1,345 bitcoins ($103 million).
“Roman Sterlingov funneled more than $400 million of fraudulent returns via Bitcoin Fog, his cyber currency ‘blending’ facility that was obtainable to felons looking to mask unclean earnings,” affirmed Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Nicole M. Argentieri, who oversees the DoJ’s Criminal Division.
“By way of his criminal money laundering endeavor, Sterlingov facilitated criminals in cleaning gains from drug smuggling, technological offenses, identity theft, and the exploitation of minors.”
This sequence of events follows closely after the DoJ similarly sentenced a Nigerian individual, a 33-year-old named Babatunde Francis Ayeni, to a decade in federal detention for his involvement in an extended digital deception plot affecting over 400 victims in the U.S., resulting in a collective deficit of nearly $20 million.
Ayeni and his accomplices were part of an “advanced business email imposture plan targeting real estate contracts in the U.S.,” as detailed by the DoJ.
“The plot victimized over 400 individuals across the U.S. Among them, 231 victims were unable to reverse the wire transactions and fell prey to full-loss transactions. The cumulative loss among these 231 victims stood at $19,599,969.46.”
Furthermore, the DoJ lately sentenced Kolade Akinwale Ojelade, a 34-year-old Nigerian citizen, to a term exceeding 26 years of incarceration for duping potential home buyers and others into transferring advance payments using an adversary-in-the-middle (AitM) email phishing and spoiling trick, resulting in channeling funds to bank accounts under his command. The deceitful operation is presumed to have caused financial damages surpassing around $12 million.
“Mr. Ojelade dispatched deceptive emails to real estate establishments, acquired unauthorized entry to numerous accounts, and scrutinized their email communication to determine moments of significant transactions,” elucidated the DoJ in a declaration.
“Subsequently, he intercepted cable payment instructions, altered the data, and retransmitted the emails utilizing spoofed email aliases mimicking the genuine senders’ addresses.”
The sentencing also correlates with the apprehension of 130 suspects, comprising 113 foreigners, predominantly of Chinese and Malaysian descent, and 17 Nigerian collaborators by the Nigeria Police Force for their “suspected involvement in high-tier cyber offenses, hacking, and operations challenging national welfare.”
About Author
