Does this go towards the White House ballroom with a few coins tossed to the ring kissers? For real, what happens to this $15 billion?
DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
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Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#382Seems organised crime is taking advantage of less-policed (or lawless) regions in Cambodia and Burma. The spectre of a similar scam has resulted in lower Chinese tourism to Thailand. Basically Chinese (among other nationalities) tourists were led from the airport by fake immigration staff, put into cars and driven to Burma and forced to work 18 hour days in scam call centers. A chilling but extremely worthwhile read.…
As a Thai person I want to clarify its not Thai people doing this, it's Chinese people who have setup scam call centers near the golden triangle (where law enforcement is non-existent, it is a drug trafficking area) who are running the show, and they exclusively target only Chinese people.
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#383Earlier quoted context omitted.
Content: "Once you’ve been to Cambodia, you’ll never stop wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death with your bare hands. You will never again be able to open a newspaper and read about that treacherous, prevaricating, murderous scumbag sitting down for a nice chat with Charlie Rose or attending some black-tie affair for a new glossy magazine without choking. Witness what Henry did in Cambodia – the fruits of his geni…
Pol Pot probably was more proximally at fault.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pol_Pot
You can point the fingers everywhere, you can also say the French were at fault because of the core of the Khmer Rouge group were scholarship students who were sent to France to study socialism, came back with that education and used to to establish the Khmer Rouge.
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#384Seems organised crime is taking advantage of less-policed (or lawless) regions in Cambodia and Burma. The spectre of a similar scam has resulted in lower Chinese tourism to Thailand. Basically Chinese (among other nationalities) tourists were led from the airport by fake immigration staff, put into cars and driven to Burma and forced to work 18 hour days in scam call centers. A chilling but extremely worthwhile read.…
Spent significant time in Vietnam & Cambodia & Thailand. Cambodia is a sad country full of desperate people. "less-policed" is the entire country. ~50 years since https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambodian_genocide . Vietnam was by far my favorite of the three and the contrast between the three countries is stark.
Yes they are not on the same level, Thailand used to be far ahead but has stagnated and Vietnam has caught up, Cambodia is so far behind you cannot imagine it will ever catch up with its neighboring countries. They still use dollars as currency because the local currency is so unstable
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#385Wow. $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.
Not sure if you're joking about the victims getting their money back. In case you're not, they won't.
The DOJ adds seized crypto to the American crypto reserve. https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/03/fact-sheet-pr...
From the webpage: " The Executive Order begins to resolve the current disjointed handling of cryptocurrencies seized through forfeiture by, and scattered across, various Federal agencies. Currently, no clear policy exists for managing these assets, leading to a lack of accountability and inadequate exploration of options to centralize, secure, or maximize their value. Taking affirmative steps to centralize ownership, control, and management of these assets within the Federal government will ensure proper oversight, accurate tracking, and a cohesive approach to managing the government’s cryptocurrency holdings. This move harnesses the power of digital assets for national prosperity, rather than letting them languish in limbo. "
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#386Earlier quoted context omitted.
Were? they still are. It's not even a small amount there are thousands of people at these centers.
also this isn't a "lawless" region that OP is talking about they are in city centers in Cambodia and the Cambodian police and government officials are all getting paid off to let them operate freely. it really is disgusting to see this level of corruption and that its going to have long term economic impact on Cambodia and Cambodians abroad.
Makes you think that idea of spreading democracy is not just a cover for power struggles, but something really important
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#387Earlier quoted context omitted.
Content: "Once you’ve been to Cambodia, you’ll never stop wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death with your bare hands. You will never again be able to open a newspaper and read about that treacherous, prevaricating, murderous scumbag sitting down for a nice chat with Charlie Rose or attending some black-tie affair for a new glossy magazine without choking. Witness what Henry did in Cambodia – the fruits of his geni…
I know I'm wonderful at parties but I catch so much shit, here but not especially, when I point out the incredible wrongs and the sheer body count of America's colonialist projects here into the modern day. It really cannot be overstated. The developing world is still developing thanks to it's own institutional issues, to be sure, as everywhere else on the globe struggles with, but America has never had a larger, str…
Early ancestors a few tens of thousands of years ago had a genocide only operating model that wiped out a majority of males for a couple millennia. Crazily enough, apparently Slavery was an innovation in that era.
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#388Earlier quoted context omitted.
All the wallets were drained years ago and [1] says the bitcoin "are already in the government’s possession, custody and control". [1] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nyed.53...
I'm now completely confused. Wallets were drained years ago? So $15B worth of bitcoin was already transferred? From whom to whom? And then why is this entire post considered news, if the wallet is empty?
My guess is that as soon as feds got their hands on the seed phrases they transferred the bitcoin to a wallet they made. The case then ground on for a few more years and now that they have the indictments all lined up, they are actually doing the forfeiture process.
The actual taking of the bitcoin is merely taking custody of the bitcoin. The forfeiture process changes the actual _ownership_. Think in terms of when the feds take cash from a car. FIRST they actually take the cash THEN LATER they file the forfeiture.
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#389Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, but my point is that quite a few people argue that owning crypto (or gold, which is why I also brought that up) protects you in the situation where societal structure fails, and they just obviously don't.
Yes, and I agree with that point. I just think you haven't extended it to its natural conclusion which is that if societal structure fails, even physical possession of things you own isn't going to help you if you have gangs of criminals rioting and looting. Consider for example what happened in Haiti in 2018+. What matters is rule of law, not possession. If you have strong rule of law, you have some protection for w…
I think we are in full agreement, really.
Having gold on your person in a societal collapse is going to be somewhat better than having a slip of paper that says you own gold (in theory you could barter with it) but neither is going to help you much. When the shit actually hits the fan to that degree, the best thing you can be is heavily armed.
But my personal plan is to just hope the shit never hits the fan to that degree while I'm alive and not really worry about it. Its effectively a singularity event beyond which I don't think there's much point in planning for it as an individual.
Re: DOJ seizes $15B in Bitcoin from 'pig butchering' scam based in Cambodia
#390How can you scam 15B and not be smart enough to make your btc unaccessible ?
It’s not about “smart” as much as perfect execution. Bitcoin’s design is very brittle, so he had to do everything perfectly every time but they only needed a single opening. People try various things to split up wallets but those are complicated for a criminal who doesn’t have many people they trust and targeted attacks by nation-state level adversaries are extremely hard to stop (e.g. for an operation of this level,…
You can just send it to a cold wallet, bury it and say oops lost ?