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Ilya Lichtenstein, a hacker behind one of history’s biggest cryptocurrency thefts, received a five-year prison sentence.
In 2016, he orchestrated the theft of 119,754 Bitcoin from Bitfinex by authorizing 2,000 fraudulent transactions. He later teamed up with his wife, Heather Morgan, to launder the stolen funds.
The couple pleaded guilty on August 3, 2023, to conspiracy charges tied to money laundering. The court will later sentence Morgan on November 18, and Lichtenstein will serve three additional years of supervised release after his imprisonment.
The Bitfinex heist, initially valued at $71 million, became one of the largest cybercrimes ever as Bitcoin’s value skyrocketed. To crack the case, the IRS-Criminal Investigations unit, FBI, Homeland Security, and blockchain forensics firm TRM Labs worked together for seven years. 4 replies
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