Karma? The man shared his photos with an inexplicable amount of money. He was arrested by the FBI for money laundering through cryptocurrencies
2 min read
A Russian rapper was arrested by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) at apartment in Miami. They face charges for money laundering. The FBI also suspects that Boiko has been working with the international hacking group QQAAZZ, which is responsible for tens of millions of dollars of theft.
He was described as “a major cyber criminal.” Maksim Boiko said he had only $ 20,000 raised by investing in BTC and renting his Russian property when crossing the US border. However, the investigation showed that he had exchanged hundreds of thousands of dollars for Bitcoin through the now defunct BTC-e platform.
In the arrest warrant for Boiko is:
“The Instagram social media and Apple iCloud accounts contain his 2015 photos, with significant amounts in US and foreign currencies. Searching the FBI databases revealed that the email account […] was used to register the account on BTC-e. […] The registrant using this email provided the name ‘Maksim Boiko’ and the user name ‘gangass.’ BTC-e data showed that the Boiko account received $ 387,964 deposits and collected approximately 136 bitcoins”
Karma, or was the FBI lucky?
The most interesting thing about the whole case is the way the man drew attention to himself. Almost as if he felt inviolable. How else can you explain that he took a picture with a stack of banknotes that the FBI says might come from crime and posted the photos on Instagram? It is this fact that has led to an increase in the interest of the authorities in his person and could be one of the “reasons” for his current arrest, although certainly not the only one.
Photos of the rapper posing with large bundles of money dating back to 2015 were also found on his mobile. In a statement, FBI Special Agent Samantha Shelnick said that she and her team used digital paper tracks to uncover the main money laundering operation operated by a shadow crime organization known as QQAAZZ.
Raper Maksim Boiko is considered to be closely related to gang leaders. Boiko, now charged with a money laundering conspiracy, continued to release music under the Smells Weed Music label. Earlier this week, he was still active on Twitter. On Monday he wrote: “In Miami, a zombie country is real. Everything is completely closed.” Now he could “sit” for a while.
