BOSTON – The United States Attorney’s Office has filed a civil forfeiture action to recover cryptocurrency alleged to be proceeds of a business email compromise (BEC) fraud scheme targeting a Massachusetts business.
As CUToday.info has been reporting, BEC attacks have continued to grow, with credit unions among the targets of attacks that mimic an internal email and which request that a payment be made to an outside vendor.
The government reported it seized cryptocurrency from seven accounts located at Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange and custodian. The seized cryptocurrency included bitcoin (BTC), Tether (USDT), APE (APEcoin), JASMY (an Ethereum token), OGN (Origin Protocol), SHIB (Shiba Inu), XEC (eCash), TLM and BNB (Binance coin).
‘Allegedly Tricked’
“In March 2022, a federal investigation began into a BEC scheme targeting a Massachusetts business that was allegedly tricked, through a fraudulent email, into wiring $898,342 from its Massachusetts bank account to a bank account opened in California,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. “From that transfer, proceeds were traced to another bank account and then to a cryptocurrency exchange where the funds were converted to Bitcoin. From there, the funds, in the form of cryptocurrency, were transferred through a series of intermediary cryptocurrency addresses, in a manner consistent with tactics employed in money laundering transactions.
“Ultimately, some of the funds were traced to accounts located at Binance, where they, or things of equivalent value, were seized in August and September 2022,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office added.
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