Tag: Bitzlato

The $4.2 billion criminal settlement with Binance and the sentencing of its founder, Changpeng Zhao (CZ), was not an isolated event—it marked the beginning of a new regulatory era. In 2024 and 2025, multiple crypto platforms have come under fire for facilitating money laundering, especially in connection with online gambling, cyber fraud, and unregulated exchanges.

The founder of Hydra, the notorious dark web drug marketplace, has been sentenced to life in prison by a Moscow court. Stanislav Moiseyev, along with 15 accomplices, faced charges of running a criminal drug enterprise. Their sentences include hefty fines and the confiscation of assets, marking a major crackdown on the dark web's illicit economy.

The U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) has indicted Roman Pikulev, a/k/a Roman Boss, a Russian national, for his role in founding and operating Cryptonator, an unlicensed crypto exchange alleged to have processed over $235 million in illicit funds. According to the indictment, Pikulev and his associates ran Cryptonator from 2014 until March 2023 and operated as an international money laundering scheme, catering primarily to criminals.

Before Western sanctions against Russia over the Ukraine invasion began in February 2022, U.S. authorities were cracking down on the Russian crypto scene. Since the beginning of the new sanctions in 2022, the American approach against the Russian crypto scene, which is under general suspicion of money laundering and sanctions violations, has intensified and is bringing charges against Russian crypto schemes and their masterminds.

According to Reuters, Binance processed almost $346 million in bitcoin for the Russian crypto exchange Bitzlato. The company's founder Anatoly Legkodymov was arrested by U.S. authorities last week for allegedly running a money laundering scheme. The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued an order identifying Bitzlato Limited d/b/a Bitzlato (www.bitzlato.com) as a primary money laundering concern in connection with Russian illicit finance

While the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued an order that identifies the virtual...