The kidnapping and murder of a Bitcoin holder in Ukraine shocked the local community. According to police, four men aged between 24 and 29 carefully planned the crime in order to steal the three Bitcoins held by the victim.
The brutal kidnapping and murder of a foreign Bitcoin holder in Ukraine has shocked the local community. According to a police statement yesterday (29), four men aged between 24 and 29 carefully planned the kidnapping of the victim in order to steal three Bitcoins worth approximately $207,000.
Police said the suspects' methods were extremely cruel. After being beaten, the victims were forcibly dragged into a car and taken to an abandoned building in the Kiev area.
They forced the victims to transfer Bitcoin to their crypto wallets before strangling them and burying their bodies in the forest.
The police investigation found that the attack was premeditated and that they had changed the license plate and appearance of the car in an attempt to evade detection, but the suspects have been detained by the police and are not allowed bail. They are charged with premeditated murder, robbery and concealing criminal acts, and face life imprisonment. The cash converted from the stolen Bitcoin and other evidence have also been recovered.
Privacy is an important part of security
Violent attacks against cryptocurrency holders are not uncommon — for example, several attendees at the recent EthCC conference in Brussels, Belgium were robbed.
In his “Bitcoin User’s Guide to Organized Crime” published earlier this month, OG Bitcoiner and Casa co-founder Jameson Lopp noted that criminals often identify victims through social media posts, public conversations, meetups, conferences, and “sophisticated data collection from known and unknown vulnerabilities.” He wrote:
Privacy is an important part of security. While it won’t completely protect your wealth, it’s a good strategy to have in your security toolkit. The basic premise is that the less criminals know about you, the less likely they are to target you.
Therefore, whether in dressing or showing off wealth, you should be low-key, try to avoid wearing cryptocurrency peripherals, or store real assets in hidden wallets, and only keep some "bait"-level assets in directly established wallets. I hope everyone will not encounter offline crypto crimes and do their best to avoid and prevent them.
