Estonians Accused Of $575 Million Crypto Fraud Ran A Fake Virtual Bank
Last Updated on 23 November 2022 by CryptoTips.eu
The US department of justice has accused two men in Estonia of organizing a sophisticated crypto ponzi scheme in which they had set up a fake virtual bank (called Polybius) with it’s own website and all.
Two 37-year-old men, called Sergei Potapenko and Ivan Turogin, have been arrested by Estonian police and the US authorities are asking for their extradition. The men allegedly stole some $575 million via the scheme.
HashFlare
The bank had promised to open a branch in Brussels in 2018 already and even launched an (online) initial coin offering, a public sale of digital currencies. Some 32 million was raised with the ICO alone. Some 26,000 people registered at the bank (which never actually opened), among whom many hundreds of people in the Netherlands and Belgium.
Seeing that the ICO launch was so popular, the Estonians offered their investors a chance to also buy into the bank’s cryptocurrency mining operations, called HashFlare.
Two Estonians accused of $575mn crypto fraud. Another criminal enterprise. Their crypto mining service was called HashFlare and their fake bank Polybius "was neither a bank nor paid dividends that were promised". https://t.co/JjyxEI0Nuj via @financialtimes
— Helen121 🕷💙⏹🇪🇺 (@Helen121) November 22, 2022
According to the FBI’s statement, the Estonians were able to raise half a billion dollars’ worth of HashFlare contracts. However the crypto mining operations nor the actual bank ever existed.
In order to get to know from who money was actually taken, the FBI has now launched a website to seek victims. Don’t worry, this is a real website of the US government.
