In the vast Israeli online trading fraud case, the Bavarian Central Cybercrime Unit announced charges against a 47-year-old Israeli national implicated in the fraudulent investment platform GetFinancial. He allegedly worked for the group as head of the analysis department and the "Trading and Education Department", among other things. The GetFinancial case is closely linked to the family of cybercrime mastermind Gery Shalon.
The Public Prosecution Office in Bavaria, Germany, brought charges against the operators of fraudulent binary options platforms, including GetFinancial. Israeli nationals aged 34, 34, and 62 must answer in proceedings, the prosecutors informed. The GetFinancial scheme was launched in 2015 with a boiler room in Israel. Additional boiler rooms have been set up in Georgia, Moldova, and Armenia in subsequent years. Tens of thousands of victims in Germany and many more in other jurisdictions lost their money.
The news is actually not really new anymore. The Israeli Chen Ganon was arrested in Cyprus a few weeks ago at the request of the German public prosecutor's office. Ganon was one of the managers in Gal Barak's cybercrime organization. He was responsible for the broker scam SafeMarkets and has worked in the boiler rooms in Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. We spoke with Ganon several times in 2018, and he confirmed the allegations against Gal Barak and E&G Bulgaria.
Currently, the indictments and trials against the operators of the Israeli scam network around GetFinancial are taking place in Germany. Around the GetFinancial scam, fund recovery scammers preyed on GetFinancial victims, posing as agents of the Cypriot regulator CySEC. The fund recovery scam victims' deposits were made to accounts at FCA-regulated high-risk payment processor NordPay Financial Ltd d/b/a CentralPay and Paysite Cash. NordPay collapsed following disputes between the founders and went into administration in April 2021.
A victim has provided documents to FinTelegram that are included in the criminal files surrounding the Broker scams GetFinancial, o4trade, Fivecircles, and others. Authorities have traced the money from victims to ultimate recipients over and have also discovered the facilitating payment processors. Besides the notorious illegal German payment processors like SecurePort GmbH, they also found advCash, MoneyNetInt, DIXIPAY, and the regulated Cypriot e-Money Institute SEPAGA E.M.I. Limited.
Earlier this year, German prosecutors filed charges against Israeli scammers in the so-called GetFinancial Case. In June 2022, an Israeli court approved the extradition of four suspects Nimrod Blechman (33), Chen Malka (31), Pavel Kotler (47), and Yuri Dashevsky (33). Now it became known that the prosecutors in Liechtenstein are investigating Nadav Gover and others for money laundering in the GetFinancial case. Evidently, they used bank accounts in Liechtenstein to launder the stolen money.
Israelis media reports confirm FinTelegrams reports regarding the German request regarding the Israeli lawyer David Bar-El. According to Posta, the International Department of the State Attorney's Office confirmed that David Bar-El, 37, a citizen of Israel and Georgia, is in the process of being deported to Germany for prosecution in the GetFinancial Case. The German prosecutor Mamkus Karmann leads the case. David Bar-El is the brother-in-law of cybercrime mastermind Gery Shalon.
We have been analyzing the cybercrime investigations and indictments of the Austrian and German law enforcement agencies. Most recently, the public prosecutors' offices in Bamberg, Rostock, and Cologne caused a stir with action days in Israel, Cyprus, Ukraine, Serbia, Bulgaria, and other jurisdictions. The respective law enforcement agencies investigate different cases but share their findings and coordinate their actions and charges. They do not prosecute individual scams but work on the hypothesis of criminal organizations.
German law enforcement authorities have decided to hunt down and shut down the Israeli scammer scene worldwide. They target scam-facilitating broker platforms, payment processors, and marketing companies. In August 2021, German law enforcement raided PandaTS, early October, they raided offices in Bulgaria, Georgia, Cyprus, and Israel to crack down on an Israeli cybercrime organization and its scams. Four suspects have been arrested. One of them is Pavel Kotler, allegedly one of Gery Shalon's key finance guys. The Israeli Snitching Game is on.
Yes, it's true. The GetFinancial scam wasn't the biggest scam of the cybercrime organization that German, Austrian and Israeli law enforcement cracked down on this week. During a law enforcement day in Tel Aviv, 20 people were temporarily detained and questioned. Four individuals are reported to remain in custody and be extradited to Germany. In connection with this cybercrime organization, the name of Israeli lawyer David Bar-El is repeatedly mentioned. Another update with more names.
Simona Weinglass provided an update on the GetFinancial Case and the respective law enforcement actions in Israel, which have been initiated by German prosecutors. Allegedly, 15 people have been questioned by the police, four are said to be extradited to Germany. Court documents show that the cybercrime organization ran the scams GetFinancial, IntegraOption, SolidCFD, TradeSolid, BitCapitalMarkets, MyCoinbanking, Procapitalmarkets, Profitstrade, FXPace, Acceptrade, and Gainfintech using the platforms SpotOption and Tradologic.
This morning it was announced via Israeli media that up to 20 arrests have been made in Israel at the request of the German prosecutor's office. Allegedly, 4 to 6 Israelis are to be extradited to Germany to face charges of binary options and broker fraud. According to the latest information, it is said to be an action by the prosecutor's office in Bamberg, Germany, in connection with the GetFinancial scam. We do not have a definite confirmation yet. The international law enforcement operation is said to have taken place in Israel and Georgia, where the organization is also said to have operated boiler rooms.