Turkish Police Arrest 24 Suspects Involved in Hacking Crypto Firm, Local Media Reports

Turkish police have arrested 24 people allegedly involved in a 13 million Turkish lira ($2.47 million) hack from an unnamed crypto firm in Istanbul, local government-backed media Daily Sabah reported on Feb. 12.

Following a report of an alleged hack from a crypto-related company in Istanbul, the city police’s Cybercrime Department found that that stolen money was moved out directly from hacked accounts to accounts on other exchanges. The money was reportedly stolen in major cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH) and Ripple (XRP).

Turkish police further launched an operation to track the suspects, and discovered that the suspected individuals were communicating through popular online multiplayer battle royale game PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG).

According to the report, the police raids were carried out in eight Turkish provinces, including Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Afyonkarahisar, Bursa, Edirne, Bolu and Antalya. As a result of the operations, the police have seized 54,000 TRY or around $10,000 in cash and 1.3 million lira worth of cryptocurrency (around $246,000).

22 suspects were reportedly referred to the Istanbul Courthouse in Çağlayan, while the other two were released by prosecutors after their legal procedures were finished at the police station. Eventually, six of the suspects were arrested by the court, with 16 suspects released under judicial control.

Earlier today, the New Zealand Police have reported that recently hacked crypto exchange Cryptopia was ready to be relaunched and resume operations, while the exchange’s website was still offline with its social media also dormant.

At the beginning of the month, a 20-year-old American pleaded guilty to the theft of $5 million in cryptocurrency from 40 victims through SIM swapping, and accepted a plea deal of 10 years in prison.