Two Chinese Citizens Arrested for Fraudulent Crypto Investments

Morrissey Technology – The United States government arrested two Chinese citizens for committing crypto fraud, which stole at least USD 73 million or around IDR 1.1 trillion from its victims. These two people are Yicheng Zhang, a Chinese citizen who lives in Temple City, California, who was arrested in Los Angeles on Thursday (16/5), and Daren Li, who holds Chinese and St Kitts and Nevis citizenship, who was arrested at Atlanta airport on last April.

These two people are accused of carrying out a crypto investment fraud known as the pig butchering scheme, which is thought to have become a global “industry” worth billions of dollars. For your information, pig butchering is a mode of fraud using social engineering techniques. The perpetrator will persuade the victim to invest in a fake crypto platform, and when the investment is large enough, all the invested assets are then taken.

So, what Zhang and Li did was open a bank account in the US using the name of a shell company. The victim was persuaded to save the money in the account. Then the funds were transferred to a number of countries and also exchanged in the form of cryptocurrency FOR4D, which was then laundered by being sent to a bank account in the Bahamas.

“Even though fraud in the crypto market takes various forms and hides in faraway places, the perpetrators remain within reach of law enforcement,” said US Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco.

Zhang and Li were charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering and six counts of international money laundering. If found guilty, they face a maximum sentence of 20 years for each count convicted.