ROME (Reuters) – Italian police mentioned on Monday a person who ran a cryptocurrency alternate that was declared bankrupt final 12 months is suspected of being answerable for a collection of hacks that precipitated losses of 120 million euros ($146 million).
Greater than 230,000 folks had been defrauded by the cyber-theft of a cryptocurrency known as Nano which was held by the corporate BitGrail, the postal police mentioned in an announcement.
“It’s the greatest cyber-financial assault in Italy and one of many greatest on this planet,” the police mentioned.
“For the primary time in Italy and in Europe, we now have documented fraudulent and rapacious conduct to the detriment of buyers carried out fully on IT platforms and by way of using digital currencies.”
Police mentioned the suspect was a 34-year-old from Florence, and gave his initials as F.F. He faces expenses of pc fraud, fraudulent chapter and money-laundering. It was not instantly potential to contact the person or his legal professionals.
F.F. himself contacted police in February 2018 to flag the hack and the lack of “an enormous sum” of Nano Coin, a thinly traded forex which was launched in 2015.
Ivano Gabrielli, director of the nationwide centre for cyber crimes (CNAIPIC), instructed Reuters that after it began to analyze it grew to become clear the BitGrail chief was concerned.
“It isn’t but clear whether or not he participated actively within the theft or if he merely determined to not improve safety measures after discovering it,” he mentioned.
The police mentioned it might have been straightforward to stop the theft as soon as the primary hack had been noticed, however as an alternative, “F.F. knowingly failed to stop them”, thereby permitting the Nano forex to be drained from accounts.
($1 = 0.8223 euros)
Reporting by Antonella Cinelli, modifying by Crispian Balmer and Mark Heinrich
