An email hacking scheme defrauded over 1,000 victims in 47 states and 19 countries out of about $215 million. Authorities have now found 25 defendants guilty of their involvement in the international money laundering and fraud scheme.
The case focused on a type of scheme called “business email compromise,” a fraud technique that redirected payments through email. According to court documents and evidence presented, the schemers’ objective was to gain access to e-mail accounts belonging to individuals, businesses, and other organizations.
Once they had accomplished that, they would monitor each email user’s correspondence and other activities to gain insight into their contacts and business procedures. The co-conspirators would send a fraudulent email requesting payment to either the victim or someone in contact with the victim, after obtaining sufficient information about the nature of the victim’s activities.
“Because the co-conspirators were familiar with the victims’ activities, the fraudulent e-mails were crafted in a way to convince recipients that the request for payment was for legitimate business activities,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Ohio, wrote in a statement. “Once members of the conspiracy obtained payment from victims, conspiracy members used a web of fraudulently created bank accounts and cash transfer systems to launder and distribute the funds.”
The victims would then send wire transfers totaling between tens of thousands and millions of dollars. In one case, a victim company transferred $2.7 million to a bank account controlled by a member of the conspiracy.
Seized assets included nearly $1.2 million worth of cashier’s checks, cryptocurrency, cash, and three luxury watches: a $45,000 Patek Philippe Nautilus, a $30,000 Audemars Piguet Royal Oak, and a $140,000 Richard Mille Felipe Massa.
Hackers are also targeting cryptocurrency like never before
According to DL News, cryptocurrency projects experienced their worst month ever for hacks in April 2026.
According to DefiLlama data, 29 cryptocurrency projects experienced hacks or exploits in the last month, the highest monthly total in crypto history. Code bugs caused 24 out of the 29 incidents.
“The situation has sparked a crisis of confidence among the industry’s most ardent believers and left them questioning whether the tradeoffs inherent in decentralized technology are worth the trouble,” the outlet wrote.
Crypto security firm Certik reported, “Combining all the incidents in April we’ve confirmed ~$651M lost to exploits.” It was the highest losses recorded since March 2022 (excluding the Feb. 2025 Bybit hack).
Meanwhile, during Elon Musk’s lawsuit against OpenAI, the billionaire stated during testimony about the cryptocurrency that “some of them have merit, but most of them are scams.”