The U.S. Division of Justice (DoJ) has introduced prices in opposition to two Russian nationals for working billion-dollar cash laundering providers for cybercriminals, together with ransomware teams.
The costs contain cash laundering, financial institution fraud, and facilitating web sites that promote stolen bank card info and private information.
The 2 people are Sergey Ivanov, utilizing the alias “Taleon,”and Timur Shakhmametov (a.okay.a. “JokerStash” and “Vega”).
Ivanov is accused of laundering over $1.15 billion in cryptocurrency by way of the UAPS, PinPays, and PM2BTC providers, whereas Shakhmametov allegedly operated one of many largest carding markets, “Joker’s Stash,” which made earnings of at the very least $280 million and as much as $1 billion.
In line with the DoJ, Shakhmametov promoted Joker’s Stash on cybercriminal boards and was concerned in financial institution fraud and cash laundering in his function on the card store.
UAPS and PinPays acted as intermediaries for cash transfers and funds, and each had been confirmed to have been concerned in transactions with carding web sites like Rescator.
Rescator allegedly bought information from the notorious Goal PoS breach in 2013, when as much as 40 million playing cards and information of about 70 million people had been stolen.
PM2BTC was a cryptocurrency alternate working primarily with Bitcoin, serving to criminals convert between crypto and fiat cash with none know-your-customer (KYC) mechanism in place.
The U.S. DoJ says that between July 2013 and August 2024, roughly 32% of all Bitcoin transactions related to Ivanov’s platforms had been traced again to legal exercise.
Joker’s Stash was a well-liked, long-running card store, providing on the market information from round 40 million cost playing cards yearly. The platform operated between 2014 till 2021 when its administrator determined to shut it down.
Even three years after Joker’s Stash threw within the towel, legislation enforcement authorities continued to gather and study proof, finally resulting in the particular person behind it.
This motion passed off underneath the identical operation that focused Cryptex, a cryptocurrency alternate that the U.S. Treasury sanctioned yesterday for laundering cash from Russian ransomware teams.
The Dutch authorities seized servers internet hosting PM2BTC and Cryptex, and confiscated cryptocurrency value over $7 million in the course of the motion.
In the meantime, the U.S. Division of State introduced rewards of as much as $11 million for info resulting in the whereabouts of Ivanov or Shakhmametov.
Final week, legislation enforcement authorities in Germany seized 47 cryptocurrency alternate platforms hosted within the nation and working in violation of KYC rules, facilitating cash laundering for cybercriminals, together with ransomware gangs.
Notable platforms taken down because of the operation, codenamed “Ultimate Alternate,” embrace Xchange.money, 60cek.org, Bankcomat.com, and Banksman.com, which collectively had over 1.2 million accounts and processed over 3.5 million transactions.