5 people were arraigned before the public prosecutor’s office in Paris on Wednesday, following investigations conducted by theCentral Bureau for Combating Crime Related to Information and Communication Technology (OCLCTIC). It concerns the theft between the end of 2021 and 2022 of several NFT from the Bored Apes collection, for a total of more than $2.5 million. If these kinds of proceedings are still rare, we will especially remember that the investigation and legal developments arose from the high-level investigations of a member of the crypto community.
5 NFT Thieves Indicted
Reported by AFP, we learned yesterday that 5 young adults have been charged in Paris for acts oforganized gang fraud, money laundering and association of criminals.
So it is in total 7 people who were placed in police custody on Monday, including the 2 parents of one of the defendants, all young adults born between 1998 and 2003. At the end of the measure, two of the people involved, identified as the key players in this case, were the subject of a claim of pre-trial detention.
The facts date from the last quarter of 2021 and relate to the theft of 5 NFTs from the famous collection Bored Monkeysfor an estimated damage of approx $2.5 million. One of the NFTs alone was valued at over $1 million.
In detail, the alleged perpetrators of this case are said to have set up a scam consisting of attracting owners of Bored Aped and dangling them an upgrade of their NFT, in this case an animation. Victims were invited to interact with a booby-trapped smart contract, allowing perpetrators to steal their belongings.
Christopher Durand, deputy head of the OCLCTIC, said the investigations began “initiated by the end of 2021”. And if the fine digital sleuths have meticulously tracked down the tracks of the indelicate, it’s thanks to the first work of a well-known member of the ecosystem that has greatly facilitated the work of the forensic police investigators.
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Zach is back
If you happen to be on social media, and more specifically on Twitter, the platypus logo straight out of a spy novel is probably familiar to you.
ZachXBTbecause it’s about him, it’s made a specialty of sniffing out scammers, harassing scammers and, in general, shining a sharp light on the sometimes lackluster backstage of the fledgling crypto industry.
Master in Social Engineering, OSINT (Open Source Intelligence, Research in Open Sources) and Analytics on the chainthe person concerned is not on his first attempt.
Over time, Zach has built a solid reputation as a detective. He has worked on a few of the various scams and other hacks that – much to the dismay of the community and much to the satisfaction of the regulators – are literally on the rise in the crypto industry.
Unscrupulous influencers or real petty thieves, the taciturn waterfowl spare no effort and time to help the community in the event of a hack and graciously offer their assistance when needed. Among other achievements, he recently worked on the hack of the artist’s wallet beeplethe latter having dedicated a work to him in thanks for the work done for the benefit of the whole community.
On August 9, 2021, it was he who posted the results of his first investigations into the theft of the famous NFT Bored Apes, creating the domino effect that led to the indictment of our 5 alleged crooks.
Community protection
While the market is sluggish and the entire ecosystem is subject to a torrent of criticism, even swear words, the fundraising work of actors such as ZachXBT must be weighed and valued at fair value.
On the one hand, it allows us to remember that our small industry is culturally the warehouse a long tradition of disinterested community and mutual aid. These are values that are at least as important as decentralization or uninsurability.
On the other hand, Zack’s actions show that the industry is not all immaturity, greed and anger. But that it is also able to self-regulate and progress organically towards greater security and credibility thanks to the action of its members. In short, that she is able to come out of her turbulent adolescence in the long term to evolve into an era of reason, essential for mass adoption.
One last point to conclude. While regulators of all kinds now seem to make anonymity/pseudonymity a useless and even a little suspicious thing to fight against, would Zach have been able to carry out his mission if he had worked in full light and with an uncovered face?
You can check out ZackXBT’s work on his official website and why not, take the opportunity to make a donation in crypto to his community wallet to help it in its work.