Security News > 2023 > June > Russians charged with hacking Mt. Gox crypto exchange, running BTC-e
Russian nationals Alexey Bilyuchenko and Aleksandr Verner have been charged with the 2011 hacking of the leading cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox and the laundering of around 647,000 bitcoins they stole.
The U.S. Department of Justice also charged Bilyuchenko with conspiring with Russian national Alexander Vinnik to run the unlicensed BTC-e Bitcoin trading platform between 2011 and 2017.
In September 2011, a group including the two defendants hacked Mt. Gox, the largest bitcoin exchange at the time, stealing roughly 647,000 bitcoins over the next few years.
Bilyuchenko, Verner, and the other group members laundered the stolen bitcoins through various means, including bitcoin addresses associated with their accounts on two additional exchanges and a specific user account on Mt. Gox.
A Bitcoin brokerage service known as the New York Bitcoin Broker also helped them transfer more than $6.6 million to overseas bank accounts between March 2012 and April 2013 under the guise of an advertising services contract.
"Mt. Gox was the world's largest bitcoin exchange at the time, and the defendants used their unauthorized access to steal the bulk of the bitcoins held by Mt. Gox customers."