American prosecutors have indicted a man from Singapore for using stolen identities to illegally utilize Amazon Web Services’ cloud computing power for crypto mining. According to the indictment filed on Oct. 1, Ho Jun Jia was charged with eight counts of wire fraud, four counts of access device fraud and two counts of aggravated identity theft. Impersonating a game developer The document states that, from October 2017 to February 2018, Ho Jun Jia — also known under the aliases Matthew Ho, Prefinity and Ethereum Vendor — has stolen several identities and accounts, including from an unnamed Los Angeles-based game developer. …

Around 72,000 devices in 2019 alone were infected during a suspiciously cheap yet successful malware campaign to steal cryptocurrency, new data warns. MasterMana continues to spread According to the research report published by cyberintelligence company Prevailion on Oct. 2, the MasterMana botnet uses budget Russian malware that is delivered as a Trojan via a phishing email scam. The malware itself likely costs just $100, though the hackers also required a virtual public server at a cost of $60. Despite costing just around $160 in total, MasterMana achieved considerable success, Prevailion warned, concluding that the bad actors behind it reached 2,000 …

Executives at the Bank of Ireland (BOI) could join a trial in the case against Mark Scott, who allegedly helped launder nearly $400 million via cryptocurrency scam OneCoin. Four BOI witnesses to testify remotely On Sept. 29, the government of the United States submitted a court motion seeking the testimony of four witnesses via closed-circuit television from a remote location in Ireland. Initially set for Oct. 7, the trial has been adjourned to Nov. 4, while a final pretrial conference is scheduled for Oct. 28, as reported by fintech publication FinanceFeeds in early September. All four witnesses are current or …

Scammers asked British citizens for nearly $2.5 million in Bitcoin (BTC), claiming that the funds will be spent to maintain the local economy after Brexit. Physical letters vs emails Fraudsters apparently sent out physical letters to the British, posing as a private secretary of Queen Elizabeth II, according to one of the alleged copies revealed by an exec of a local tech firm. Paul Ridden, CEO at United Kingdom-based IT firm Smarttask, posted a picture of the letter on Sept. 24 on LinkedIn, chuckling about the apparently failed phishing scam and asking if anyone else have received something similar to …

Binance claims to have assisted British prosecutors in an investigation of an online fraud that resulted in over $51 million losses by victims. Criminal is now jailed On Sept. 26, Binance’s chief compliance officer Samuel Lim published a blog post saying that the exchange was working with the Cyber Crime Unit of the United Kingdom’s Metropolitan Police Service to investigate into Bulgarian phishing expert Svetoslav Donchev. As officially reported by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), Donchev, 37, was extradited to the U.K. from Bulgaria to face the online scamming fraud charges and pleaded guilty to five offences to receive a …

A South Korean court ruled on Sept. 25 that the CoinOne cryptocurrency exchange must reimburse 25 million won ($20,800) to an investor after he was hacked. The attacker used the investor’s personal login and password to steal 45 million won, while a daily withdrawal limit of 20 million won was supposed to be in place. Stolen login details The theft occurred in late December 2018, when the investor’s CoinOne exchange login details were stolen. An attacker, who had hidden their IP address using a VPN in the Netherlands, converted all of the investor's cryptocurrency holdings into Bitcoin (BTC), which was …

Nigerian crypto wallet Satowallet has allegedly pulled off a $1 million exit scam, while the firm cites an unexplained OVH data server error that has kept user funds in limbo. Multiple versions to delay withdrawals After users first reported withdrawal issues in April 2019, Satowallet has been citing different versions of events to account for their failure to withdraw over $1 million in crypto, according to a report by the Financial Times (FT) on Sept. 25. Following the first complaints, Satowallet reportedly cited technical reasons as the source of a temporary problem, which came amid the firm’s plans to launch …

Scammers are using fake mainstream news articles to advertise a nonexistent and potentially dangerous Bitcoin investment platform. “Bitcoin Profit” features fake celebrity interviews According to the dedicated website used to lure would-be clients, the so-called “Bitcoin Profit” uses celebrity endorsements as part of its marketing strategy. The site, economicsworld[dot]info, includes testimony from the likes of actress Kate Winslet and Australian businessman Andrew Forrest, also known as Twiggy. With alleged backing from Richard Branson, Elon Musk and Bill Gates, Bitcoin Profit is one of the more brazen scams to emerge from the cryptocurrency underworld. Each celebrity has a feature with their …

The British Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has warned the public about First BTC FX, a supposed clone firm offering fraudulent crypto investments. Using details of an FCA-authorized firm According to an FCA warning published on Sept. 20, First BTC FX is posing as authorized firm First Global Limited. First Global is a trade name for nonprofit organization International First Committee Association. First BTC FX also claims to represent a trade name of First Global on its website firstbtcfx.com. Clone firms posing as legal entities The scam entity claims to provide premium-quality trading services for commodities, forex, indices, shares and cryptocurrencies. …

Security researchers have identified a new trend of lucrative and illicit conversions from Bitcoin (BTC) to cash in their analysis of dozens of dark web marketplaces and forums. Financial scammers are selling cold, hard cash for only 10 to 12 cents on the dollar to buyers willing to provide a prepaid fee in Bitcoin, according to the new Q3 2019 Black Market Report from Armor’s Threat Resistance Unit. Dodging risks The money laundering scheme sees cybercriminals offer up bundles of cash — typically from $2,500 to $10,000 — in exchange for a 10% to 12% fee payable in Bitcoin. Once …

Updated: Sept. 12, 11:30 PM UTC: Upon contacting the lawyers in the case, Cointelegraph has clarified that Coinbase had not settled in the case, but rather agreed to facilitate a transfer of funds from a hacker to the hacking victim. The article has been corrected accordingly. The United Kingdom arm of cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has agreed to transfer lost Bitcoin to the victim of an email phishing attack (BTC) after a court order to reveal the hacker’s identity. Stolen Bitcoin diverted to Coinbase On Sept. 10, legal news site Law360 reported that Coinbase U.K. had agreed to transfer the 60 …

The offices of Chinese initial coin offering (ICO) startup GXChain have reportedly been closed by the local police. On Sept. 11, Dovey Wan — founding partner of blockchain-based investment company Primitive Ventures — tweeted a photo of an office taped closed (presumably by Chinese police) and announced that GXChain “got clamped down by the Chinese police.” She also said that she believes the project to be notable and legitimate: “GXChain was a very hot ICO back in the days with ATH market cap over $600M (even now still holds $48M) and considered to be among the very few legit ICOs.” …