Russian cryptocurrency Garantex seized by law enforcement

The US Secret Service, working with a coalition of international law enforcement agencies, has downloaded and conquered the Garantex website, a Russian cryptocurrency exchange accused of being linked to Darknet markets and ransom hackers.

On Thursday, Garantex’s official website was replaced by a notice saying that the exchange domain was seized from the secret service following an order from the US lawyer for the Eastern District of Virginia.

This is the latest action taken by Western governments against Moscow-based exchange.

Last month the European Union also sanctioned Garantex as, reference It is “closely linked to EU sanctioned Russian banks.” It was part of a package of sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.

In 2022, American Treasury sanctioned GarantexHe claims that over $ 100 million transactions made on the stock exchange “are associated with illegal participants and markets of DarkNet,” including the famous Russian Running Band of the Conti and Hydra of Darknet Market.

Download Notice, which is evident from TechCrunch, it is said that the operation was coordinated with the US Department of Justice, the Federal Investigation Bureau, Europol, the Dutch National Police, the German Federal Police Service (Bundescriminet or BKA), the general prosecutor of Frank’s general prosecutor.

TechCrunch addressed all these comment organizations. During writing, only the FBI answered, refusing a comment.

TechCrunch also addressed Garantex through the official email addresses listed on the site before seizure, as well as through the company’s Telegram account. Garantex did not respond to these messages.

TechCrunch checked the website seizure notice by analyzing Garantex domains on the Internet. As of Thursday, Garantex’s web domain is already pointing servers known to be controlled by Secret Service. The same server is also a host of several other notifications to seize websites made by the Secret Service in recent years.

After seizure, Garantex does not mention the law enforcement operation in its official telegram channels. On Thursday morning, Garantex declared that this is “stopping all services, including the withdrawal of cryptocurrency”, according to a machine translation of the message.

The decision came after the Stablecoin Tether issuer froze $ 28 million in his cryptocurrency on Garantex.

“We have bad news,” Garaothi writes. “We are fighting and we will not give up! Please note that all (Tether) in the Russian portfolios are currently threatened. “