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Alexander Vinnik is accused of using the cryptocurrency exchange BTC-e, an exchange used to trade the digital currency bitcoin, since 2011, to launder more than $4 billion for people involved in crimes ranging from computer hacking to drug trafficking.
US authorities also linked him to the failure of MtGox, a Japan-based bitcoin exchange that collapsed in 2014 after being hacked. Vinnik "obtained" funds from the hack of MtGox and laundered them through BTC-e and Tradehill, another San Francisco-based exchange he owned, they said in the statement. "Just as new computer technologies continue to change the way we engage each other and experience the world, so too will criminals subvert these new technologies to serve their own nefarious purposes," said Brian Stretch, US Attorney for the Northern District of California, where Vinnick was indicted. Greek police described Vinnik as a "an internationally sought 'mastermind' of a crime organisation."
