FBI’s most wanted: Dives into the life of ‘crypto queen’ Ruja Ignatova
Just like the character Annie in the chartbuster track ‘Smooth Criminal’ released by ‘King of Pop’ Michael Jackson, investors in the designated Bitcoin-competing OneCoin token did not realize when they were scammed by its charming, ingenious and vicious interplay. founder, Ruja Ignatova.
With a total of over 3.5 million members who initially bought instructional packages instead of the OneCoin cryptotoken, a sum of over $ 4 billion was eventually drained from her when she apparently disappeared just before a mega OneCoin event in 2017.
Ruja is on the FBI’s most wanted list, and has also issued a red message from Interpol against her for crimes that were immortalized while she was at the head of OneCoin Ltd. and OneLife Network Ltd, the companies behind the Ponzi scheme, which she co-founded with Sebastian Greenwood in 2014.
The OneCoin failure, described by The Times as “one of the biggest scams in history”, left the world both shocked and surprised at the sheer finesse with which Ruja constructed every detail that led to her disappearance.
Ruja comes from Bulgaria and specializes in private international law from prestigious institutions such as the University of Konstanz and Oxford University, and was approved to support her ambitions and also boasted of work experience from reputable organizations such as McKinsey & Company.
Married to a German lawyer Björn Strehl, she gave birth to a daughter in 2016 and received brownie points from her investor base when she thanked them in a video that was posted immediately after.
Ruja was skilled at charming and exciting audiences with her exuberant personality, and was hailed as the “crypto queen” for her greater aura than life and was quite obsessed with holding large events to promote her cryptocurrency.
Unaware of most of her investors, however, Ruja prepared her exit plan while enticing more investors to buy the OneCoin token, and even tried to intervene with her husband to imply someone else when she fled with more than 230,000 Bitcoins.
While Ruja followed the typical pyramid structure to entice initial investors to sell the OneCoin token to other buyers for a healthy commission, it is even more surprising that the token was never listed on any cryptocurrency exchange and did not even have a blockchain supporting it. transaction framework.
In addition, the Bulgarian Financial Supervisory Authority (FSC) issued a warning about potential risks involved in cryptocurrencies as far back as September 2015, citing the OneCoin token as an example for investors to be wary of.
However, that did not stop Ruja from interacting with its partners to promise faster, cheaper and more secure transactions than the Bitcoin network and even marketed OneCoin as a “Bitcoin killer”.
Although all the negative media coverage should have discouraged investors, Ruja cleverly bypassed all these actions and received calls such as stopping all activity in Bulgaria, directing all transactions to foreign banks and a number of similar tactics to evade the authorities while he called in even more investors. with her enigmatic personality.
With reports speculating that she jumped between luxury penthouses and yachts to run away from the authorities, Ruja was last known to have traveled to Athens before disappearing from the public eye.
She left behind all known relatives, including her daughter, husband and even brother, Konstantin Ignatov, who is a co-conspirator in the OneCoin scam.
While Ruja’s brother Konstantin, co-founder Karl Sebastian Greenwood and his lawyer Mark Scott have all been arrested and then charged, her husband continues to be under constant surveillance and has been the subject of several raids.
The 42-year-old is even believed to have had connections with powerful Russian and Bulgarian criminal syndicates, and unconfirmed reports claim to have seen her in Dubai, Thailand and other tourist destinations since her disappearance.
Despite her apparent criminal status and after causing despair to millions of investors, Ruja became even more infamous when BBC Radio 5 Live released the podcast ‘The Missing Cryptoqueen’ in 2019, a hit with the general public and cryptocurrency fans around the world. .
While some theorize that she may have undergone plastic surgery to change her appearance and even assumed an alternative identity, the mystery surrounding her disappearance continues to captivate the world.
