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Journalist
Hassan Shittu
Journalist
Hassan Shittu
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The U.S. Justice Department, in coordination with Germany and Finland, has dismantled the online infrastructure of Garantex, a cryptocurrency exchange accused of facilitating money laundering for criminal and terrorist organizations.
The exchange, which has processed at least $96 billion in cryptocurrency transactions since 2019, has been taken offline following law enforcement action.
Crypto Exchange Garantex Taken Down After $100M in Illicit Transactions
The case is being prosecuted by the Justice Department’s National Cryptocurrency Enforcement Team and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.
As part of the operation, the U.S. government seized three domain names linked to Garantex, including Garantex.org, Garantex.io, and Garantex.academy. Visitors to these websites now see a notice stating that law enforcement has taken over them.
Meanwhile, German and Finnish authorities have confiscated the servers used to operate the platform. Additionally, U.S. law enforcement has frozen over $26 million in funds associated with Garantex’s activities.
The crackdown coincides with the unsealing of an indictment in the Eastern District of Virginia against Aleksej Besciokov, a Lithuanian national residing in Russia, and Aleksandr Mira Serda, a Russian national living in the United Arab Emirates.
The two men, who allegedly controlled and operated Garantex, are facing multiple charges, including conspiracy to commit money laundering. Besciokov has also been charged with conspiracy to violate U.S. sanctions and running an unlicensed money transmitting business.
According to prosecutors, Garantex knowingly processed transactions linked to hacking, ransomware attacks, drug trafficking, and terrorist financing, often impacting U.S. victims. The indictment states that Besciokov and Mira Serda took deliberate steps to obscure criminal activities on the platform.
In one instance, when Russian law enforcement requested information on an account linked to Mira Serda, Garantex allegedly provided false and incomplete data to conceal its ownership.
In April 2022, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Garantex for laundering illicit funds. Despite this, prosecutors say Besciokov and his associates continued to operate the exchange, restructuring its activities to bypass sanctions.
Court documents reveal that Garantex moved its cryptocurrency wallets daily to evade detection, making it harder for U.S.-based exchanges to block transactions linked to the platform.
If convicted of money laundering conspiracy, both Besciokov and Mira Serda face up to 20 years in prison. Besciokov could receive an additional 20 years for violating sanctions and five years for operating an unlicensed money transmitting business.
Lazarus Group, Ransomware Ties: Garantex Falls Under U.S. Sanctions
The crackdown on Garantex marks the culmination of a years-long investigation by U.S. authorities into illicit crypto transactions.
The Treasury’s OFAC sanctioned Garantex in April 2022 for facilitating ransomware payments and darknet activity, linking over $100 million in transactions to cybercriminals, including the Conti Ransomware-as-a-Service group and the Hydra marketplace.
Estonia’s Financial Intelligence Unit revoked Garantex’s license in February 2022 over AML/CFT violations, but the exchange allegedly continued laundering funds.
Court filings reveal that founder Sergey Besciokov and co-conspirators evaded sanctions by frequently changing wallet addresses to avoid detection.
Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic found that North Korea’s Lazarus Group laundered over $30 million in stolen crypto through Garantex.
U.S. authorities have now seized Garantex’s domains, frozen $26 million in illicit funds, and obtained its internal databases. Tether cooperated by freezing $27 million in USDT held in Garantex wallets, forcing the exchange to suspend operations.
This action follows a broader crackdown on illicit crypto services, with recent sanctions against platforms like Tornado Cash, Blender.io, and Sinbad. The EU also blacklisted Garantex on February 26 for ties to sanctioned Russian banks.
In response, Russian lawmaker Anton Gorelkin admitted to ongoing Western pressure but maintained that crypto markets would remain accessible to Russia.
As it stands now, this is just a takedown of the crime empire; the big things are coming with cases that will follow this.
