The Russian citizens Roman Vitalyevich Ostapenko, Alexander Evgenievich Oleynik, and Anton Vyachlavovich Tarasov were charged by the U.S. Department of Justice on Friday with running businesses that helped thieves wash their cryptocurrency.
In a press release, the head of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, principal deputy assistant attorney general Brent Wible, said that the three were part of running Bender.io and Sinbad.io, two cryptocurrency mixers “that served as safe havens for laundering criminally derived funds, including the proceeds of ransomware and wire fraud.”
Blender.io and Sinbad.io were taken by international police in 2023. They were thought to have been used by North Korean hackers, who are very good at stealing and laundering millions of dollars in cryptocurrency, as well as ransomware gangs, who make money by making companies pay them money.
The DOJ said in a news release that Ostapenko and Oleynik were arrested on December 1, 2024, but Tarasov is still on the run.
Wible says that these three “made it easier for state-sponsored hacking groups and other cybercriminals to make money from crimes that put public safety and national security at risk.”
Ostapenko is accused of laundering money and running an illegal money-transfer business. Oleynik, 44, and Tarasov are accused of plotting to launder money and one count of running an illegal money-transfer business. If found guilty, all three could face 30 years in prison.
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