'Comedic rapper' charged over Bitfinex hack laundering out on bail
New York resident Heather Morgan, 31, claims to be many things: “a serial entrepreneur, prolific writer, irreverent comedic rapper, and investor in B2B software companies with high growth potential.”
But her LinkedIn bio doesn’t mention anything about her alleged capability to help launder hacked cryptocurrency.
Yesterday morning, FBI agents arrested Morgan — or was it her rapper alter-ego Razzlekhan?— and her husband Ilya Lichtenstein for allegedly conspiring to launder crypto connected to the 2016 Bitfinex hack that saw 119,756 Bitcoin (BTC) drained from the crypto exchange.
The pair have strongly proclaimed their innocence during a New York court appearance on Tuesday and were released on multi-million dollar bonds.
This whole thing is a psyop to make us look stupid for being hacked by the most inept criminals on earth
The 119,756 BTC stolen from Bitfinex was worth $72 million in Aug 2016, but is now valued at more than $5.1 billion. Since the 2016 hack, individuals connected to the stolen coins have periodically moved small amounts of BTC in separate transactions, leaving the bulk of the funds untouched.
The DoJ reported that it had traced 25,000 BTC of these transferred funds to financial accounts controlled by Lichtenstein and Morgan. Special agents were then able to gain access to and seize more than 94,000 BTC — worth $3.6 billion at the time — from Morgan and Lichtenstein after a search warrant allowed them to view files containing private keys to the wallet.
According to the DoJ complaint the pair are charged with laundering conspiracy and conspiracy to defraud the United States, however they are not charged with carrying out the hack itself. The first charge can be punished by up to 20 years in jail and the second
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