The American secret services have seized the field of the exchange of Russian cryptocurrency sanctioned Guarantx in collaboration with the criminal division of the Ministry of Justice, the FBI and Europol.
The other authorities responsible for the application of the laws involved in this action include the Dutch national police, the German Federal Criminal Police Office, the Office of the Prosecutor General of Francfurt, the Estonian National Criminal Police and the Finnish National Office of Investigation.
Earlier in the day, Gassius was also forced to suspend services due to blocking its digital wallets after the The European Union has sanctioned the exchange of crypto As part of its 16th set of sanctions against Russia, which Target 542 individuals and entities.
“We have bad news. Tether entered the war against the Russian cryptographic market and blocked our portfolios in the amount of more than 2.5 billion rubles”, the Garantex team said In a telegram post on Thursday.
“We temporarily suspend the provision of all services, including the conclusions of the cryptocurrency, for a while, while the whole team solves this problem. We draw your attention to the fact that all the USDs on Russian wallets are now in danger.”
After entering the Domaine de Garantex Guarantsex (.) Org, the secret services have also changed names from names to ns1.usssomainseizure.com And ns2.usssomainseizure.com.
The Russian exchange was previously sanctioned by the Treasury Foreign Assets Office (OFAC) in April 2022, after more than $ 100 million in Guarantx transactions were linked to the Darknet markets and cybercrime players, including the designed driving operation (RAAS) notorious and the hydra Dark web market.
“The majority of Guarantx operations are carried out in Moscow, including at the Tower Federation, and in Saint Petersburg, Russia, where other exchanges of virtual currency sanctioned have also worked”, ” OFAC said at the time.
GIANTEX lost its license to provide virtual currency services in February 2022 after the financial intelligence unit in Estonia found links between GIOUSTEX and the portfolios used for criminal activity and critical compliance problems with anti-whiteness policies and for the financing of terrorism policies (LMA / CFT).
“Despite the loss of its Estonian license to provide virtual currency services following the survey of the Estonian financial unit, Guarantx continues to provide services to customers by unscrupulous means,” added OFAC.
Two years later, the OFAC sanctioned the exchanges of Crypto Cryptx and PM2BTC for money laundering for Russian ransomware gangs and other cybercrime groups.
He also targeted the exchanges of Crypto Bitpapa, Toep and Crypto Explorer in March 2024 and appointed the Sinbad Crypto-Mélange services, Tornado Cash and Blender.io to whiten money for the hacking group of Lazarus North Korean.
