Arrested for money laundering, Bitcoin Fog Operator faces many charges, along with mixing 1.2 milion BTC.
Law enforcements from the US arrested the Bitcoin Fog Boss last Tuesday. He is Roman Sterlingov from Los Angeles. Through the Bitcoin Fog mixer, Sterlingov laundered over 1.2 million Bitcoin. Federal investigators said that Sterlingov ran the operation for ten years and processed $336 million in BTC transactions.
Bitcoin Fog Boss Charged with Money Laundering
The US government charged Roman Sterlingov with money laundering with a use of a Bitcoin mixer. He was the lead administrator in the Bitcoin Fog that used a Coinjoin-based mixing tool to blend the BTC UTXOs.
Bitcoin Fog can be viewed on Tor with an onion address, it requires a registration, and a deposit of 0.01 BTC. The registration process was not tied to an email, but it requires a username and password.
The US IRS accused Sterlingov of money laundering without tracking any of the payments. Prosecutors assume that Sterlingov has taken in around $8 million in bitcoin, acquiring 2% fee per mix on Bitcoin Fog. He has been accused of processing 1.2 million BTC, which is equal to $336 million in the time of all the transactions.
“Analysis of bitcoin transactions, financial records, Internet service provider records, e-mail records, and additional investigative information, identifies Roman Sterlingov as the principal operator of Bitcoin Fog,”
Devon Beckett, the IRS’s Criminal Investigation special agent
Sterlingov faces charges namely; “Money Transmission without a License,” “Money Laundering,” and “Unlicensed Money Transmission.”
Bitcoin Fog Boss Exposed!
Some report details alleged transactions by Sterlingov going back from 2011, it gave the IRS clues that they needed to catch him. Sterlingov supposedly used these transactions to set up the server of Bitcoin Fog.
“This is yet another example of how investigators with the right tools can leverage the transparency of cryptocurrency to follow the flow of illicit funds,” Jonathan Levin, Chainalysis Cofounder
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