BlockBeats news reported on January 3 that a man stole others' virtual currency and converted it into over 1.6 million yuan after incurring losses while helping a friend invest in futures. Recently, the Huli District Prosecutor's Office in Xiamen, China, reviewed and prosecuted this theft case.
In September 2021, the defendant Chen was introduced to the victim Hong by a friend. At that time, Hong had a strong interest in virtual currency investments, and Chen had some knowledge in this area. Hong entrusted Chen to help with virtual currency investments and provided his account and login password.
In June 2022, Chen incurred debts after suffering losses while helping a friend invest in futures. Consequently, he developed the idea of stealing virtual currency from Hong's account.
At the end of September 2022, Chen fabricated a story about his account being offline to deceive Hong into providing various verification codes. He then successfully changed the account's login password and replaced the registered email with his own. By this point, Hong's account was under Chen's control.
After that, Chen repeatedly claimed that the account was offline to trick Hong into providing real-time verification codes, continuously transferring the virtual currency from Hong's account to his own. He then quickly sold these virtual currencies for a profit of over 1.6 million yuan and used all of it to pay off personal debts.
In May 2024, Chen voluntarily went to the police station to confess and truthfully described his crimes.
The Huli District Prosecutor's Office has legally prosecuted Chen for theft. According to Article 264 of the Criminal Law, theft of public or private property with a particularly large amount or other particularly serious circumstances shall be sentenced to more than ten years in prison or life imprisonment, and shall also be fined or have property confiscated.