Singapore-based cryptocurrency exchange DragonEx has notified its users that it suffered a hack, according to an official announcement on the platform’s Telegram Channel on March 25. The incident— described as “attacks from hackers” that resulted in the transfer and theft of both “users’ [...] and Platform crypto assets,” reportedly occurred on March 24, and was immediately detected by DragonEx. An admin from the exchange notified users that: “Part of the assets were retrieved back, and we will do our best to retrieve back the rest of stolen assets. Several Judicial administrations were informed about this cyber crime case including Estonia, …

Law enforcement in Mumbai, India have arrested four more suspects allegedly involved in a cryptocurrency scam that amassed an estimated 1 billion rupees (over $14 million). English-language daily media outlet The Times of India reported on the arrests on March 22. Per the report, the police arrested Ashok Goyal Jaipuria, Asif Malpani, Baljit Singh Saini and Pradeep Arora from Delhi. Several of Goyal’s bank accounts have been reportedly frozen as well, since he is allegedly the head of the scheme. The Times of India also states that an unnamed Bollywood actor who reportedly attended promotional events of the scam will …

Former operator of now-shuttered crypto exchange BTC-e, Russian national Alexander Vinnik, has appealed with a Greek court for his release or extradition to Russia, local media outlet Kathimerini reported on March 21. Vinnik — who is accused of fraud and laundering as much as $4 billion in Bitcoin (BTC) over the course of six years — has reportedly filed an appeal with Piraeus court for his release or extradition to Russia for humanitarian reasons. Prior to that, Russia’s Commissioner for Human Rights Tatyana Moskalkova asked both the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet and Greek Justice Minister …

The former CEO of reported cryptocurrency scam AriseBank has pleaded guilty to defrauding victims of over $4.2 million, Texas-based daily news outlet Dallas News reported March 21. Jared Rice, whom the FBI arrested over securities and wire fraud in November last year, confessed to his activities, according to an announcement by the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, Erin Nealy Cox. Rice had allegedly falsely claimed that AriseBank could offer customers “FDIC-insured accounts and traditional banking services, including Visa-brand credit and debit cards, in addition to cryptocurrency services.” The announcement, seen by Dallas News, reportedly shows that …

Israeli fintech companies that work with forex and crypto trading are being targeted by malware, according to a blog post from threat research department Unit 42 of cybersecurity company Palo Alto Networks published on March 19. Per the report, Unit 42 first encountered an older version of the malware in question, Cardinal RAT, in 2017. Since April 2017, Cardinal RAT has been identified when examining attacks against two Israel-based fintech companies engaged in developing forex and crypto trading software. The software is a Remote Access Trojan (RAT), which allows the attacker to remotely take control of the system. The updates …

The founder of what reportedly claims to be Australia’s first online mattress retailer OzMattress and cryptocurrency fund manager Stefanos Papanastasiou is about to be brought to court by his clients over the loss of over AUD$20 million ($14.2 million). Daily Australian newspaper The Age reported about the controversy on March 19. Per the report, Papanastasiou told his clients in 2017 that he had spent half a million Australian dollars ($355,000) to develop an algorithm that delivers substantial returns through the trading of Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH)-based tokens. According to the claim filed by property developer Savvas Alexiadis, one of …

Almost 90 percent of cryptocurrency exchanges’ reported trade volumes may be incorrect, new research from trading analytics platform The Tie warned in a digest released on March 18. Reporting on figures gathered from 97 exchanges, researchers found that the vast majority of the volume claimed to come from users may not in fact exist. The revelations came as a result of calculations of lesser-known exchanges versus well-known businesses such as Binance and Kraken. “In total we estimated that 87% of exchanges reported trading volume was potentially suspicious and that 75% of exchanges had some form of suspicious activity occurring on …

Security is paramount in crypto. “Keep your hardware wallets safe,” we're told. “Keep your private keys safe.” “Keep your seed words safe.” “Keep your computer safe.” This list could go on almost indefinitely, and while you might be forgiven for assuming that it contained only objects of an electronic or cryptographic constitution, you'd be wrong. Because one of the most important links in this chain of security is your own self. Yes, what good is a securely held private key if thieves force you at gunpoint to tell them what this key is? This might seem like an improbable risk …

Cryptocurrency mining is reportedly one of the most observed objectives of hackers attacking businesses’ cloud infrastructures, according to a report by AT&T Cybersecurity on March 14. The cybersecurity wing of United States telecoms firm AT&T stated that organizations of all sizes continue to face major crypto mining attacks despite the ongoing bear market. In the new report, AT&T examined the most significant forms of cryptojacking associated with mining attacks on organizations’ cloud infrastructure. AT&T outlined four major cryptojacking tactics used by hackers such as compromising container management platforms, control panel exploitation, theft of application programming interfaces (APIs), as well as …

A Google Chrome browser extension tricking users into participating in a fake airdrop from cryptocurrency exchange Huobi claimed over 200 victims, a security researcher reported in a blog post on March 14. The extension for Chrome web browser, with the name NoCoin, gained 230 downloads before Google deleted it, according to Harry Denley, who runs cryptocurrency scam database EtherscamDB. Denley noted that hackers had purposely disguised the malicious extension to look like a tool protecting users from cryptocurrency malware or so-called cryptojacking. “From the start, it looked like it did what it should — it was detected [sic] various CryptoJacking …

Canadian police are seeking information on individuals alleged to be involved in defrauding Bitcoin (BTC) ATMs (BTMs), according to an announcement published by the Toronto Police Service on March 13. The Calgary Police Service (CPS) Cybercrime Team has asked the public to assist in the identification of four individuals allegedly involved in multiple fraudulent transactions made within the country and targeting one Canadian Bitcoin firm. The CPS initially received the information in October 2018. The press release states that in September of last year, the suspects allegedly made 112 fraudulent transactions at BTMs in seven Canadian cities, including Calgary, Toronto, …

The Australian anti-money laundering watchdog has suspended the registrations of two cryptocurrency exchanges in connection with a drug trafficking case, the agency announced in a press release on Friday, March 8. The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) — a government financial intelligence agency that aims to prevent money laundering, tax evasion, welfare fraud and terrorism — suspended the two crypto exchanges’ operations because of their association with a suspect in an alleged organized crime syndicate. According to the joint press release from AUSTRAC and the Australian Federal Police, a 27-year-old man has been arrested on several drug trafficking-related …