458 Individuals Arrested in Hong Kong Over $60M Crypto-related Scams

• Police in Hong Kong arrested 458 individuals from 314 instances involving cash laundering.
• About $15 million was laundered by way of money withdrawals and cryptocurrency transactions.
• Arrested victims have been concerned in monetary crimes like on-line purchasing, job searching, and others.

The police in Hong Kong have arrested 458 individuals from 314 instances involving cash laundering of virtually $60 million. In keeping with reviews, about $15 million of the whole quantity was by way of money withdrawals and cryptocurrency transactions. 

A current report confirmed that the arrested victims have been concerned in numerous monetary crimes, chopping throughout on-line purchasing, job searching, funding, cellphone calls, and on-line love scams. 

In keeping with the police in Hong Kong, some cash laundering syndicates lured some members of the general public to promote their financial institution accounts for between $40 to $200 and used the accounts to launder felony proceeds from completely different scams. 

The authorities famous that in eight months, spanning October final 12 months to June this 12 months, the felony syndicate laundered as much as $15 million by way of money withdrawals and cryptocurrencies.

Different discoveries made by the Hong Kong police embody a puppet account managed by triad members. Reportedly, the puppet account acquired greater than $27 million in proceeds from suspected unlawful bets between January final 12 months to February this 12 months. One of many accounts was used to obtain funds from a web based purchasing rip-off involving 40 victims.

These arrested by the police embody 330 males and 128 females aged between 15 and 82 years. The police famous that some arrested individuals have been additionally victims of on-line courting or job-hunting scams. The victims claimed they mistrusted on-line characters and handed over delicate data to them.

The police added that some members of the syndicate of their custody have been discovered to have invited a few of the arrested individuals with the promise of serving to them to obtain financial institution money rebates. They have been tricked into handing over copies of their ID playing cards, taking selfies with their cell phones, and serving to them open digital financial institution accounts in personal for cash laundering.