Fled Crypto Founder, $2 Billion Missing as Siblings, Senior Employees Jailed

Bitcoin cryptocurrency
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Vebitcoin, a Turkish crypto exchange that traded an estimated $60 million per day, has ceased operation as authorities have now arrested four of the company's senior employees and froze the exchange's assets. This development comes in the wake of last week's collapse of the Theodex crypto exchange, a result of the founder dissapearing with $2 billion

As cryptocurrency is an attractive way to preserve savings in Turkey, and almost everyone can establish their own crypto exchange — the cryptocurrency industry in the country is flooded both with scammers and organizations led by people without proper education or experience. Last week crypto exchange Thodex ceased to serve its clients as its founder fled the country with $2 billion. In that case, the authorities jailed six former employees of Thodex but still have not found the missing $2 billion. 

Vebitcoin, a cryptocurrency exchange from Turkey, also went offline this week as authorities in the country blocked its domestic bank accounts and detained four people as part of a probe, reports CNBC. Vebitcoin's daily trading volumes before the collapse were about $60 million, according to data from CoinGecko. It is unclear how many people were affected by the Vebitcoin collapse. 

The situation with Thodex flop is also developing in Turkey as authorities arrested as many as 62 people allegedly connected to the crypto exchange over the week, reports BBC. Among the arrested are siblings of Faruk Fatih Özer, the CEO who went missing with $2 billion. Turkish government news agency Anadolu claims that Güven Özer and Serap Özer assisted their relatives and played major roles in the scam scheme. Both hold or held millions of U.S. dollars on crypto accounts on Binance, BtcTurk, and Paribu. 

Turkey is in the process of hardening its stance on crypto currencies and has already banned crypto payments.

Anton Shilov
Freelance News Writer

Anton Shilov is a Freelance News Writer at Tom’s Hardware US. Over the past couple of decades, he has covered everything from CPUs and GPUs to supercomputers and from modern process technologies and latest fab tools to high-tech industry trends.

  • LolaGT
    Oh boy.
    I am pretty doubtful there are any luxury suites in Turkish jails or prisons.
    Seems like I remember from the 'Locked up Abroad' tv show, very few prisons outside of the U.S. are comfy at all(go figure).
    Reply
  • -Fran-
    LolaGT said:
    Oh boy.
    I am pretty doubtful there are any luxury suites in Turkish jails or prisons.
    Seems like I remember from the 'Locked up Abroad' tv show, very few prisons outside of the U.S. are comfy at all(go figure).
    Yeah, because the point is to punish them, not send them on friggen paid vacations. What is a constant around the globe is one thing though: if you got enough money, it won't matter.

    That is incredibly off-topic, but it is funny to touch on.

    Cheers!
    Reply
  • SSGBryan
    And this shows why people should stay away from Cryptocurrencies. They depend on everyone being honest.
    Reply
  • thepersonwithaface45
    SSGBryan said:
    And this shows why people should stay away from Cryptocurrencies. They depend on everyone being honest.
    I'm up 7k in ETH though!
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    SSGBryan said:
    And this shows why people should stay away from Cryptocurrencies. They depend on everyone being honest.
    The lesson here is to be careful who you invest with, not what you invest in.
    Reply
  • SSGBryan
    spongiemaster said:
    The lesson here is to be careful who you invest with, not what you invest in.

    And the crypto currency reality is - you don't know who you are investing with.
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    SSGBryan said:
    And the crypto currency reality is - you don't know who you are investing with.
    It's no different than the stock market.
    Reply
  • SSGBryan
    spongiemaster said:
    It's no different than the stock market.

    It is very, very different. Crypto doesn't have an SEC to deal with.
    Reply
  • SSGBryan
    And in other good news...

    Turns out that Bitcoin is actually traceable by law enforcement.

    https://www.seattletimes.com/business/colonial-pipeline-investigation-upends-idea-that-bitcoin-is-untraceable/
    Reply