A transnational police operation has resulted in the arrest of 3,500 alleged cybercriminals and the seizure of $300 million in cash and digital assets.
Interpol on Tuesday revealed the results of what it's dubbed Operation HAECHI IV - a six-month effort that saw 34 nations cooperate, with funding from South Korea.
The operation, which concluded in December, targeted seven cyber-enabled scams: voice phishing, romance scams, online sextortion, investment fraud, money laundering associated with illegal online gambling, business email compromise fraud, and e-commerce fraud.
The majority - about three quarters - of the crime investigated by the op was business email compromise, e-commerce fraud, and investment fraud.
One described a scam detected in South Korea that saw investors lured to acquire non-fungible tokens by promises of huge payoffs.
The investors are left with worthless digital assets.
Interpol's announcement included an image of cat-related pixel art NFTs to illustrate the tokens, but didn't state whether or not they were the assets subjected to the rug-pull.
Some cases saw voice cloning tech used to impersonate people known to victims.
Alleged crims detected by the operation were often hit with I-GRIP - the Interpol Global Rapid Intervention of Payments mechanism - which stops payments so that criminal proceeds can't flow through the world's financial system.
Those orders, plus other efforts, saw Operation HAECHI IV block 82,112 suspicious bank accounts, and seize $199 million in hard currency and $101 million in virtual assets.
As we're already talking crypto, alleged crimes, and South Korea, let's catch up with Do Kwon.
They did crash, creating a $40 billion fiscal crater.
Kwon is a wanted man in both South Korea and the United States, and made his way to Montenegro in the hope of staying at liberty.
In November authorities quashed that plan, ruling that he could be extradited.
The nation's High Court cancelled the extradition order on grounds that lower courts didn't follow required processes.
The case will therefore return to Montenegro's lower courts for a fresh trial.
Interpol has hailed the operation as a win, because it resulted in a 200 percent increase in arrests compared to previous efforts.
This Cyber News was published on go.theregister.com. Publication date: Wed, 20 Dec 2023 01:13:06 +0000