DOJ Files Criminal Complaint Against Bitcoin Operator for Laundering $3 Billion

The Department of Justice filed a criminal Complaint against a Vietnamese citizen (the "Operator") for operating an online cryptocurrency "mixing" service that helped customers launder bitcoin proceeds of illicit activities.

In the Complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the DOJ alleged that the Operator’s platform facilitated the laundering of more than $3 billion in bitcoin. The DOJ alleged that the Operator violated Bank Secrecy Act requirements by failing to register his online service with FinCEN as a "money service business" and otherwise comply with applicable regulations. The Complaint further alleged that the online service allowed customers to comingle digital assets in a way that (i) hindered law enforcement efforts to trace transactions and (ii) helped conceal the origins of illicit proceeds, including ransomware payments, thefts, darknet marketplace payments, and nation-state criminal activity.

Further, the DOJ charged the Operator with identity theft for using aliases and stolen identities from individuals around the world. The DOJ noted that the Operator went to "great lengths" to conceal his true identity and location.

In a press release, the DOJ reported that U.S. authorities’ seized two domain names that routed to the platform and one GitHub account, and that German authorities’ seized the platform’s Germany-based back-end servers, as part of a coordinated international law enforcement operation. The DOJ said that the Operator remains at large and that if apprehended and convicted, the Operator faces a maximum penalty of 40 years in prison.