The exchange has been allegedly involved in laundering money for ransomware groups and other transnational cybercriminal organizations.
The post US Shuts Down Crypto Exchange E-Note, Charges Russian Administrator appeared first on SecurityWeek.
Bitcoin Magazine
22-Year-Old Pleads Guilty in $263 Million Bitcoin and Crypto Theft
A 22-year-old California resident has pleaded guilty to his role in a multi-state social engineering scheme that stole roughly $263 million in crypto.
Evan Tangeman of Newport Beach, California, admitted laundering $3.5 million in crypto for the criminal enterprise, the U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Monday.
Tangeman pleaded guilty to participating in a Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) conspiracy before U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.
Sentencing is scheduled for April 24, 2026. He is the ninth defendant to enter a guilty plea in this specific investigation.
The court also unsealed the Second Superseding Indictment, adding three more defendants. Nicholas Dellecave, also known as “Nic” or “Souja,” Mustafa Ibrahim, also known as “Krust,” and Danish Zulfiqar, also known as “Danny” or “Meech,” face charges of RICO conspiracy along with the other members of the Social Engineering Enterprise (SE Enterprise).
Dellecave was arrested in Miami on Dec. 3, 2025. Ibrahim and Zulfiqar were recently arrested in Dubai.
According to prosecutors, the enterprise began in October 2023 and continued through at least May 2025. It originated from friendships formed on online gaming platforms. The group included individuals in California, Connecticut, New York, Florida, and abroad.
The scheme involved database hackers, organizers, target identifiers, callers, and residential burglars who targeted hardware wallets containing cryptocurrency. Hackers used stolen databases to identify high-value targets.
Callers impersonated crypto exchange staff or email providers to trick victims into revealing account credentials.
Burglars physically broke into homes to steal hardware wallets.
Tangeman acted as a money launderer. He converted stolen cryptocurrency into cash using a bulk-cash converter. Tangeman then used the cash to obtain rental homes for members of the group, often listing false names on the leases.
Some properties rented for $40,000 to $80,000 per month. He secured homes in Los Angeles and Miami.
The largest known theft occurred on Aug. 18, 2024. Tangeman’s co-conspirators, including Malone Lam and Danish Zulfiqar, deceived a victim in Washington, D.C., into transferring over 4,100 Bitcoin. At the time, the crypto was valued at $263 million. The same amount is now worth more than $368 million.
Tangeman also helped Lam obtain roughly $3 million in cash from stolen cryptocurrency to secure a rental property.
After Lam’s arrest on Sept. 18, 2024, Tangeman accessed home security systems to screenshot FBI agents during searches. He also asked another member to retrieve and destroy digital devices from Lam’s Los Angeles residence.
Prosecutors said the enterprise spent stolen funds on a lavish lifestyle. Purchases included nightclub services up to $500,000 per night, luxury handbags, watches valued between $100,000 and $500,000, designer clothing, rental homes, private jets, security guards, and a fleet of at least 28 exotic cars ranging from $100,000 to $3.8 million.
With Tangeman’s guilty plea, prosecutors have unsealed charges against three additional defendants. The Second Superseding Indictment shows the investigation is ongoing. Authorities have not disclosed whether any of the stolen Bitcoin has been recovered or whether restitution will be sought.
The SE Enterprise relied on social engineering rather than sophisticated hacking techniques. The group’s operations originated from online friendships, but the stolen funds funded high-profile purchases and drew attention.
Authorities said the defendants’ extravagant spending played a role in exposing their activities.
Tangeman remains free pending sentencing.
Federal penalties for RICO conspiracy and money laundering carry significant prison terms. The Justice Department has indicated that additional charges may follow as the investigation continues.
A RICO conspiracy occurs when individuals agree to take part in a pattern of criminal activity, or racketeering, through an ‘enterprise.’ Under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), prosecutors can connect separate crimes and individuals under a single charge.
The focus is on proving a shared criminal objective, not that every participant committed every act.
This post 22-Year-Old Pleads Guilty in $263 Million Bitcoin and Crypto Theft first appeared on Bitcoin Magazine and is written by Micah Zimmerman.
Irish authorities seized $7.1 million in cryptocurrency in a raid targeting money laundering and darknet sales. Three individuals were arrested, with one remaining in custody. “The arrests of the three individuals and the assets seized are the result of a highly complex investigation into criminal darknet marketplace activities by specialist investigators attached to the Garda […]A 29-year-old man suspected of laundering the proceeds of drug trafficking was arrested in Neufs (France).
According to the information provided, the defendant created a cryptocurrency mixer at the request of a drug dealer “Drugsource” who made a profit by selling drugs through the “dark web”. It is known that Drugsource has fulfilled more than 3000 orders worth more than USD 1.5 million during its operation.
The investigation into the drug trafficker’s activities began in early September 2020. Law enforcement agencies made a control purchase and were able to obtain the address of the trafficker’s wallet. After analyzing the blockchain, the police came across a 29-year-old man whose account had been used for 14 transactions by the drug dealer. The police were able to find and arrest the accused in September 2022.
The hearing in the case of the 29-year-old defendant was scheduled for January 2023. The defendant claimed responsibility for creating the bitcoin tumbler for Drugsource, but he denied any involvement in drug sales. The court nevertheless acquitted him of drug trafficking charges, but he was facing imprisonment for money laundering on a large scale.
USD 500,000 was confiscated from the offender’s cryptocurrency and bank accounts, and his apartment in Dubai was also seized. The defendant is awaiting sentencing in February 2023 on charges of money laundering obtained from the sale of drugs.
Cryptocurrency exchange Bitzlato, better known to the Russian-speaking segment of the market, has been taken down as part of an “international cryptocurrency enforcement action,” the U.S. Justice Department announced. The Russian owner of the platform has been arrested for his role in the alleged transmission of illicit money. Bitzlato claimed it was hacked.
U.S. authorities have apprehended Anatoly Legkodymov, a resident of China, on charges that his Hong Kong-registered crypto trading platform, Bitzlato, processed illicit funds worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The Russian, a co-founder and majority owner of the exchange, was arrested by the FBI in Miami on Tuesday, a high-ranking official from the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) revealed.
Speaking during a press conference, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said that Justice Department agents and prosecutors, working with the U.S. Treasury Department and French law enforcement, have “disrupted Bitzlato, a China-based cryptocurrency exchange, notorious for laundering criminal proceeds from the darknet” and ransomware attacks. She also stated:
Today, the Department of Justice has dealt a significant blow to the crypto crime ecosystem.
Legkodymov is accused of operating the exchange as a “high-tech financial hub that, in his own words, catered to ‘known crooks’,” Monaco explained. She went on to allege that Bitzlato was a “crucial financial resource” for Hydra, the largest darknet market, with Russian roots, which was shut down in April, last year, by the German police with the support of U.S. agencies.
According to the DOJ, Hydra buyers funded illicit purchases from crypto accounts hosted at Bitzlato while sellers of drugs, stolen financial information and hacking tools sent criminal proceeds to accounts at the exchange, collectively amounting to $700 million in direct and indirect transfers between 2018 and 2022.
The deputy attorney general also said that the participants in the operation have engaged in a “coordinated campaign of disruption.” This included law enforcement actions in a number of European countries and the seizure of Bitzlato’s servers. By midday Wednesday, Bitzlato’s website was replaced by a notice saying that the service had been seized by French authorities, Reuters reported.
Also on Wednesday, the operators of Bitzlato announced on Telegram, that the exchange had suffered a hacking attack. They told users that withdrawals had been suspended indefinitely and asked them to refrain from sending coins to the platform until the issue is resolved.
“Our service was hacked, part of the funds was withdrawn from the service,” the exchange said, noting that the attackers were able to steal a small portion of the funds without specifying the amount. It also sought to assure customers in a second message that their assets were not lost, stating:
For all victims, we guarantee a refund.
“As a security measure, we have disabled the service, we ask you not to replenish the wallets of our service until the work is restored,” Bitzlato reiterated, adding that its team was working on the problem. At the time of writing, the platform is still offline.
The hack presumably took place after on Tuesday the exchange announced maintenance scheduled for Thursday, Jan. 19, “aimed at improving the operation of the service and its security.” The notice informed users it will halt transactions between 5 and 9 a.m. Moscow time.
“We strongly recommend that you organize your work activities taking into account the amendments in order to avoid unpleasant situations,” the platform advised customers, informing them that it plans to disable deposits, withdrawals and trading.
Bitzlato launched in 2016 under the name Changebot and later became a cryptocurrency exchange offering peer-to-peer (P2P) trading services. It lists pairs of the Russian ruble with BTC, ETH, USDT, and other digital coins which can be bought and sold with a variety of payment methods.
Online crypto exchangers like Bitzlato are popular in Russia and the former Soviet space but as crypto assets are yet to be fully regulated in the region, they are often targeted by authorities across the Commonwealth of Independent States. A report recently revealed that the Belarusian judiciary has imposed a hefty fine on the operator of one such platform.
Do you expect other similar operations against crypto trading platforms in the near future? Share your thoughts on the subject in the comments section below.
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