Dutch police arrested a man for allegedly laundering millions with crypto

The cyber crime team of the central Dutch police arrested a 39-year-old resident of Veenendaal, suspected of laundering tens of millions of euros via stolen cryptocurrencies.

The police also suggested that the person collected his digital assets through fake updates from the crypto wallet Electrum.

The latest crypto scam in the Netherlands

The Dutch police reported the arrest of the perpetrator on their official website. According to the investigation, after stealing amounts of Bitcoin, he repeatedly converted it to Monero and vice versa through the decentralized exchange Bisq. Thus, his fraudulent transactions were difficult to identify without thorough investigation.

However, local law enforcement agents conducted a joint operation with the Central Cybercrime Team to monitor specific BTC transactions and eventually traced those activities to the 39-year-old. When he was arrested, he was in the village of Veenendaal.

During the course of his scam, police estimated he laundered tens of millions of euros worth of cryptocurrencies. The authorities confiscated this amount and searched his home, where they seized “data carriers” to aid the ongoing investigations.

To amass his bitcoin holdings, the individual allegedly used a malicious software update for the Electrum wallet. It is an open source BTC wallet application that allows users to manage their digital assets. Without giving further details, the Dutch police stated:

“The money was stolen after phishing with malicious Electrum software pushed through malicious servers.”

A few days after the arrest, the authorities sent the man home, where he is still suspected of having carried out a fraud involving many millions of cryptocurrencies.

Crypto’s popularity is growing in the Netherlands

Fraudulent cryptocurrency schemes usually occur in regions where adoption of digital assets is at a high level. On that note, it’s worth noting that 14% of Dutch households have exposure to bitcoin or altcoins (according to a survey conducted by the European Central Bank). The Netherlands thus ranked first in the statistics, surpassing countries such as Belgium, Germany, Italy, Spain and France.

Similar to other research, the ECB estimated that the rich segment of the population finds crypto more exciting than those in the lower income brackets. Well-educated, young men represent the largest share of investors, the institution added.

In order to limit fraud with cryptocurrency, the ECB (more precisely, President Christine Lagarde) has several times proposed that the sector should operate under strict rules.