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DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

cnbc.com

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Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#91

Post by tonyhart7 »

mrandish wrote: post #29

Sounds like good news but the press release doesn't detail how the FBI managed to trace, positively identify and then seize such a huge pile of crypto ($15B) from a suspect they say took extensive steps to launder and hide the source and ownership of the crypto. I'm curious because this guy is clearly very experienced, highly sophisticated and located in a country where the government and law enforcement are obviousl…

"but the press release doesn't detail how the FBI managed to trace, positively identify and then seize such a huge pile of crypto ($15B) from a suspect they say took extensive steps"

Am I slow??? or what under circumstance that you expect FBI to told press how their operate????

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#92

Post by IanCal »

tonyhart7 wrote: post #85
Reason077 wrote: post #62

Wow. $15 billion is an astronomical, nearly unfathomable amount of money in Cambodia. This must have been a huge operation. It's almost 1/3 of the country's entire GDP! Well done DOJ. Hopefully the victims get their money back.

their business is scam center that by definition is not counted by GDP anyway

That’s not necessarily true, though may be for Cambodia. GDP can include black market activities but countries differ in whether they include specific ones and how.

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#93

Post by ValveFan6969 »

Reason077 wrote: post #62

Wow. $15 billion is an astronomical, nearly unfathomable amount of money in Cambodia. This must have been a huge operation. It's almost 1/3 of the country's entire GDP! Well done DOJ. Hopefully the victims get their money back.

The victims getting their money back would defeat the whole purpose of Bitcoin. No one knows who originally owned it.

How about cash it out and trickle it down to us... or is all that just gonna magically disappear?

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#94

Post by lifestyleguru »

Who they were scamming, Americans? How they managed to gain trust, even considering strong accent or grammatical mistakes. How do they identify and trace these Chinese fraudsters? They all look the same and have a name like Hi Lo. Where the money go... of course real estate.

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#95

Post by myrmidon »

throw-10-13 wrote: post #88

I am shocked that the organizer of a large scam call center in SEAsia is a Chinese national. Large scam call centers run by Chinese nationals are getting broken up in the region pretty regularly.

I see multiple factors here:

- There's a lot of Chinese people in the region (1.3b vs - Better access to capital for setting up big operations like this

- Much tighter control and policing in their homeland, so the scammers operate elsewhere

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#96

Post by bilekas »

tonyhart7 wrote: post #85
Reason077 wrote: post #62

Wow. $15 billion is an astronomical, nearly unfathomable amount of money in Cambodia. This must have been a huge operation. It's almost 1/3 of the country's entire GDP! Well done DOJ. Hopefully the victims get their money back.

their business is scam center that by definition is not counted by GDP anyway

That money would have flowed somewhere, also I'm not sure OP was talking about impacting the GDP just quantizing it. For Cambodia, it's an extraordinary amount of money. Actually for anywhere it's a ridiculous amount of money.

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#97

Post by [deleted] »

myrmidon wrote: post #95
throw-10-13 wrote: post #88

I am shocked that the organizer of a large scam call center in SEAsia is a Chinese national. Large scam call centers run by Chinese nationals are getting broken up in the region pretty regularly.

I see multiple factors here: - There's a lot of Chinese people in the region (1.3b vs - Better access to capital for setting up big operations like this - Much tighter control and policing in their homeland, so the scammers operate elsewhere

[deleted]

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#98

Post by IshKebab »

ValveFan6969 wrote: post #93
Reason077 wrote: post #62

Wow. $15 billion is an astronomical, nearly unfathomable amount of money in Cambodia. This must have been a huge operation. It's almost 1/3 of the country's entire GDP! Well done DOJ. Hopefully the victims get their money back.

The victims getting their money back would defeat the whole purpose of Bitcoin. No one knows who originally owned it. How about cash it out and trickle it down to us... or is all that just gonna magically disappear?

Well you could just reverse all the transactions. But they probably won't do that.

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#99

Post by vkou »

Reason077 wrote: post #62

Wow. $15 billion is an astronomical, nearly unfathomable amount of money in Cambodia. This must have been a huge operation. It's almost 1/3 of the country's entire GDP! Well done DOJ. Hopefully the victims get their money back.

Wait, hold on, I thought the promise of crypto was that:

1. The feds can't take your money.

2. Once your money's gone, it's gone.

If criminals can't count on #1 holding true, and their victims can't count on #2 holding true, what is even the point of it?

Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia

#100

Post by bilekas »

IanCal wrote: post #92
tonyhart7 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

their business is scam center that by definition is not counted by GDP anyway

That’s not necessarily true, though may be for Cambodia. GDP can include black market activities but countries differ in whether they include specific ones and how.

Right, it's not black market if you eventually pay some taxes on it somewhere. Dare we call it washed money, and for our American friends in the audience, laundered money.
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