On March 16, Sputnik quoted the US Department of Justice as saying that ChipMixer was dismantled due to its involvement in fraud, money laundering, hackers, darknet markets, etc.
US authorities coordinated with the German Federal Criminal Police to carry out an operation to take down ChipMixer, seizing servers and more than $46 million in cryptocurrency.
"This morning (March 15, local time), in coordination with domestic and foreign partners, the US Department of Justice disabled a cryptocurrency mixer that facilitated malware attacks, state-sponsored cryptocurrency purchases, and purchases in private markets globally," the US Department of Justice announced.
Minh Quoc Nguyen. Photo: FBI
The US Department of Justice stressed that it will do everything to protect victims and fight crime in the cryptocurrency sector, and affirmed that the campaign to dismantle ChipMixer in particular has disrupted criminal activity that endangers global cybersecurity.
ChipMixer allegedly processed bitcoins used by a foreign intelligence agency from August 2017 to March 2023, according to the complaint, which was first disclosed in a joint cybersecurity advisory issued by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National Security Agency (NSA) in August 2020.
Washington also accused ChipMixer of handling nearly $1 billion in bitcoin linked to stolen funds or private marketplaces during the same period, some of which are believed to be linked to North Korean hackers.
In connection with the ChipMixer case, US authorities have charged Minh Quoc Nguyen, a Vietnamese citizen, with money laundering, operating an unlicensed money transfer network and identity theft. The maximum sentence for these charges is 40 years in prison.
Minh Quoc Nguyen, born in 1973, from Quang Binh . Minh Quoc Nguyen was charged on March 14 and is wanted by the FBI.
According to the court indictment, ChipMixer allowed customers to deposit bitcoins, which were then mixed with bitcoins from other ChipMixer users, making it difficult for law enforcement and regulators to track their transactions.
ChipMixer serves many customers in the United States but is not registered with the U.S. Department of the Treasury 's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FINCEN) nor does it collect identifying information about its customers.
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