South Korea’s four major cryptocurrency exchanges, Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone, and Korbit, reportedly stated that they would support the local police in investigating the so-called “nth rooms” phenomenon, which turned into a nation-wide scandal.
Crypto Exchanges Reportedly Said Celebrities Were Users
For years, dozens of South Korean middle school girls, and sometimes boys, were filmed performing violent sexual acts and self-harm. The videos were then shared through Telegram chat rooms in exchange for payments made in cryptocurrency.
The Korean police found dozens of victims since the videos often displayed girls’ names and addresses.
After more than 5 million Koreans signed petitions to name the man who led the group that blackmailed girls and created the Telegram groups, the police decided to reveal his identity. The name of the 24 year old criminal is Cho Ju-bin.
The police also revealed that over 10,000 people used the Telegram chatrooms, with some paying over $1,200 in crypto for gaining access. So far, the police know about 74 people, including 16 minor girls, who had been exploited.
Elsewhere, reporters of local media agency Kookmin Ilbo discovered about 25,000 users across 30 such Telegram chat rooms.
Other estimates from local media claim that there were up to 300,000 paying customers using similar chat rooms.
As he was moved away from a police station in Seoul, Cho said:
I apologise to those who were hurt by me. […] Thank you for putting a brake on the life of a devil that could not be stopped.
Nevertheless, he didn’t comment when reporters asked if he admitted to the allegations.
He is charged with abuse, threats and coercion, and violating the sexual abuse act, the child protection act, and the privacy act.
Although the police haven’t confirmed it yet, there are reports that a local crypto exchange traced the crypto transactions and found out that some of the fee-paying members were popular artists, professors, sports celebrities, and startup founders and company CEOs.
Who is Cho Ju-bin and How Did the Chatrooms Operate?
The child porn suspect is a 24 year old man nicknamed “baksa,” which translates as “doctor” or “guru.” He managed the Telegram chat rooms where videos of child abuse were shared in exchange for payments. Cho charged the viewers in crypto, which made it difficult for the police to trace and shut down the chat rooms. However, given that South Korean law requires all crypto exchange clients to pass through KYC/AML verification procedures, the platform could help authorities find members and understand the magnitude of the incident.
So far, the police have tracked down 124 individuals related to the case. Cho and 17 others have been detained.
Korean newspaper, Kookmin Ilbo, said that each of the eight “nth rooms” shared videos from three to four girls who had been blackmailed. The girls were lured by chatroom operators who promised modeling or escort jobs.
Crypto Has Previously Been Praised by Pedophile Jeffrey Epstein
While it’s not the problem of the crypto space, it is not the first instance when criminals prefer or praise Bitcoin and its brethren.
Billionaire and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who was in the middle of a sex slave scandal that involved sex trafficking among many other horrific crimes, praised Bitcoin and the technology underpinning it.
Interestingly, last year, MIT’s Media Lab director Joichi Ito was forced to resign after the New Yorker revealed that he attempted to hide financial contributions from Epstein. But besides managing MIT’s lab, Ito also set up the Digital Currency Initiative (DCI) at MIT, helping Bitcoin go through some of its most difficult days in 2015.
At the time, when nonprofit Bitcoin Foundation experienced “funding constraints,” the DCI offered full-time positions to Bitcoin core developers, including Gavin Andresen, Cory Fields, and Wladimir van der Laan.
Do you think that all crypto exchanges should get clients’ personal details? Share your thoughts in the comments section!
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The European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol) executed six arrests in connection with an investigation into an international $27 million heist that scammed victims into depositing funds at a fake crypto exchange.
Police agencies from the UK and the Netherlands have arrested six people in connection with the theft of ˆ24 million ($27 million) worth of cryptocurrency. According to a statement, the gang stole Bitcoin from at least 4,000 victims across 12 countries.
It’s a new week, which means only one thing: it’s time for Hard Fork’s roundup of cryptocurrency and blockchain headlines from over the weekend. Let’s get to it. 1. Security researchers from Trend Micro have uncovered a new type of cryptocurrency mining botnet.
A South African man running a Bitcoin investment fund in KwaZulu- Natal is suspected to be running a Ponzi scheme, as early investors have seen huge returns. The man was unwilling to talk to local media about his business plan and he how generates returns for his customers.
An Australian government employee is appearing in court today after using work equipment to mine cryptocurrency for his own gain. The Australian Federal Police (AFP) allege that the 33 year-old from Killara in New South Wales took advantage of his position as an IT contractor to modify government computer systems to mine cryptocurrency.
A special South Korean investigative agency in Seoul has successfully used Artificial Intelligence (AI) to unravel a cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme that defrauded 56,000 people of more than $18. 7 million.
South Korean police have caught the masterminds of a Bitcoin-fuelled Ponzi scheme responsible for generating almost $19 million in revenue. The scam, called “M-Coin,” is said to have targeted those with poor understanding of the technology – mostly elderly people, retirees, and housewives – with promises of free cryptocurrency and recruitment bonuses for signing up others, reports Korea Joon Gang Daily.
Robert Kraft’s graphic sex tape — where he’s caught on video receiving oral sex at a Florida massage parlor — will probably be released publicly. That’s what Florida authorities said one day after the billionaire New England Patriots owner filed a motion to keep the police surveillance videos kept under seal.
Everybody wants to mine cryptos (or at least that is how it was when prices were high last year) but not a lot of people want to actually pay the energy costs for mining them. This is why we got so many crypto jacking malware around and why now why the South Korean police have […]
The other day, South Korean police detained a 22-year-old student who had used nearly 30 college computers for mining Bitcoin and Monero with no official permission
It looks like most of the stolen IOTA tokens which were lost during a $11 Million USD hack that happened recently we found. We covered this story a few days ago and now it looks like the situation will finally have its proper happy ending.
A collaborative effort between the UK’s South East Regional Organised Crime Unit (SEROCU), the Hessen State Police in Germany, the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) and Europol, has successfully identified and arrested a male suspect in connection with a case of fraud, theft and money laundering that resulted in the theft of around ˆ10 million (Approximately […]
The post Europol Arrests Suspect Behind the Theft of $11.
Several of South Korea’s top crypto exchanges have found themselves in hot water, with executives at a couple of exchanges facing criminal charges and jail time. According to a news report on the Korean website Blockinpress, the CEO of Komid, a Korean crypto exchange, has received a three-year prison sentence for committing fraud against investors by artificially inflating the exchange’s actual trading volume.
Mpumalanga police in South Africa recently arrested two men alleged to be responsible for the kidnapping of a teenager boy in Witbank City and a 13-year-old girl in Witbank. According to the police, the kidnapping team asked the victims’ relatives for a reward in Bitcoin in exchange for the young victims’ lives.
Police in Mpumalanga, South Africa, have arrested two suspects who demanded a Bitcoin ransom following the kidnapping of a teenage boy and the attempted kidnapping of a 13 year-old girl. The kidnappers demanded just over $100,000 (1.
A supposed Chinese cryptocurrency millionaire has been arrested after throwing stacks of HK $100 ($12) bills from the rooftop of a building in one of Hong Kong’s poorest districts. Self-styled Bitcoin millionaire Wong Ching-Kit announced the bizarre stunt via Facebook.
Crypto-hackers are the latest example of technology hackers to hit the mainstream. From South Korea to Great Britain, crypto-hackers have even gone so far as to hold government entities hostage to their bitcoin demands.
The South Korean police have arrested five people for injecting malware in the computer of over 6,000 people. The local police have joined efforts with the Korean National Police Agency Cyber Bureau to arrest a group of five hackers led by Kim Amu-Gae, 24, which have released 32,435 emails containing a crypto mining malware. These […]
In a report published October 25, 2018, police in New South Wales announced the arrest of a woman responsible for stealing more than $450,000 worth of XRP. Theft Details The woman was caught after the assembly of a new task force called Strike Force Rostrevor that was established in January to investigate the sudden loss of the victims Ripple tokens.
New South Wales Police have arrested a 23-year-old woman in connection to a case of theft involving over $450,000 worth of Ripple cryptocurrency. The theft incident occurred in January when 100,000 XRP were illegally removed from the online wallet of a crypto owner.
Life in Venezuela is anything but. Last year, the South American nation of 32 million led the world with 652% inflation and this year the economic turmoil is even worse. As of September 2018, the annual inflation was estimated at 200,000% and International Monetary Fund (IMF) said it could spike to a mindboggling 1,000,000% by December.
The South Korean National Police Agency has produced a report of all hacking incidents of crypto exchanges and wallets in the country during the past three years. According to local media, there were seven hacking cases of crypto exchanges and 158 cases of wallet hacks, 91 of which happened this year.
Filipino authorities have advanced on international criminals suspected of running a large-scale Bitcoin pyramid scheme. Authorities have detained two of the six individuals thought to have defrauded South Korean investors for over $33 million, while the others remain on the run.
The founder of cryptocurrency exchange OKEx was detained for questioning on September 10, 2018, by Shanghai police to investigate a case of suspected digital currency fraud related to WFee coin.
South Korean police confirmed that the company that promised to raise gold from the Russian cruiser sunk in the early 20th century turned out to be a major fraud with thousands of investors scammed.
Huazhu Hotels Group, a hotel management company in China with more than 10 hotels brands and over 3,800 hotels, reported a data breach on Tuesday, August 28, 2018, after discovering that its clients’ personal information was sold on the dark web forum.
Chinese police have recently arrested three men for hacking and stealing 600 million yuan ($87 million) in cryptocurrencies. According to the South China Morning Post, the Xian Police officers stated on Saturday, August 18, 2018, that when it came to cryptocurrency criminal investigations in China, this was the largest number of stolen cryptocurrencies in the nation.
Another Bitcoin millionaire has been caught in an elaborate cryptocurrency plot. A South Korean businessman has exchanged $2. 3M worth of Bitcoin for cash – only to find the banknotes were cheap, poorly printed fakes.
Police in China has detained three men suspected of pulling the country’s biggest ever cryptocurrency heist — worth 600 million yuan ($87 million). Theft is China’s Biggest: Reports As multiple outlets report quoting local news publication Huashang News on August 19, authorities concluded an investigation spanning almost six months into three men who allegedly hacked a computer for Bitcoin and Ether.
Three suspects have been detained by Chinese police in connection with an alleged cryptocurrency theft. The supposed hackers stole bitcoin and other digital assets worth an estimated $87 million USD.
In the old days, people invested in gold as a store of wealth as its value was universal and largely stable. However, cryptos changed the game and attracted a lot of investment which otherwise would have gone to gold.
South Korean police have raided the offices of Shinil Group, which is suspected of scamming investors with the launch of an ICO backed by gold reportedly coming from a sunken Russian battleship.
After a police raid over allegations of fraud and insolvency, UpBit, South Korea’s leading cryptocurrency exchange demonstrated full financial competence after a final audit report. Dunamoo, UpBit’s parent company, cited a report proving the exchange has ample assets to match its balance sheets.
South Korean police have asked Interpol for help with an investigation into the fraudulent token sale of Shinil Gold Coins that were claimed to be backed by the “treasure” on the sunken Dmitrii Donskoi.
Korean law enforcement agents are now pointing their searchlight into the operations of Shinil Group, a firm that claimed to have found more than $100 billion worth of gold in a sunken Russian shipwreck.
“We have nothing to hide,” says Tory Reiss, VP of corporate development at TrustToken. Like the market’s most popular stablecoin, Tether, TrustToken's TrueUSD is fiat-collateralized.
On July 11, 2018, the Chinese police apprehended over 540 people for organizing an online soccer gambling game which involved the exchange of bitcoins. The illegal betting places were conducted in south China’s Guangdong Province.
A manhunt is currently underway for a businessman that was kidnapped near his offices in Cape Town. According to some sources, a ransom of 50 Bitcoin has been demanded for the man’s return.
The U. S. Department of Justice, in cooperation with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), the Secret Service (USSS), the Postal Inspection Service (USPIS) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), have apprehended more than 35 dark web drugs and arms dealers in a nation-wide bust.
Hackers have reportedly made away with cryptocurrencies worth $30 million from Bithumb, South Korea's leading exchange, according to reports from a blog update. The exchange states that due to the hack, deposits and withdrawals will be temporarily suspended until further notice.
Kaito surged by 26%, fueled by its listing on Upbit, adding to its growing presence on major centralized exchanges. Upbit has just listed Kaito (KAITO) on its KRW, BTC, and USDT markets, with deposits only available through Base—other networks are…
Dunamu, the parent company of South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, Upbit, has reportedly taken legal action against the country’s Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) over a business suspension order.
JTO, the native token of Jito, has spiked 30% since Upbit announced it will be listing the Solana-based coin on Feb. 21 at 14:30 KST. According to a recent notice, Upbit will be adding trading support for the Jito native…
South Korea’s Financial Services Commission will soon make a decision on sanctions against Upbit, the country’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, following lapses in customer identity verifications.
The official Trump meme coin saw a 10% increase after Upbit announced it will be adding the presidential meme coin to its platform. Upbit, South Korea’s largest crypto exchange, will launch the official Trump meme coin, TRUMP (TRUMP), nearly a…
South Korean exchanges Upbit and Bithumb will add Berachain to its listings on Feb. 6, in time for the upcoming launch of Berachain mainnet. Two South Korean crypto exchanges announced that they will start providing trading support for new layer1…
South Korea’s largest crypto exchange launches trading support for the Virtuals Protocol token on its platform on Jan. 31, catapulting it by 20%. In recent notice, Upbit announced that VIRTUAL (VIRTUAL) will debut on its platform on Jan. 31 at…
