US Charges Two Canadian Nationals Over Alleged $230K Bitcoin Fraud

Two Canadians of Indian origin were charged in the United States with a $233,220 Bitcoin (BTC) fraud using a fake HitBTC account on Twitter.

Scammers posed as HitBTC customer service on Twitter

Karanjit Singh Khatkar, 23, and Jagroop Singh Khatkar, 24, of Surrey, British Columbia, allegedly stole 23.2 Bitcoin from a woman in the U.S. state of Oregon, Indian publication The Week reports on Aug. 23, citing charges filed with the federal court.

According to the report, the defendants used a fraudulent Twitter account named @HitBTCAssist to trick victims into believing they represented customer service from Hong Kong-based crypto exchange HitBTC from October 2017 until August 2018.

Using the fake HitBTC account, the alleged scammers reportedly convinced the woman to pass them her login data to take over her email, HitBTC and Kraken accounts.

Using the information, the defendants transferred over 23 BTC from the victim’s HitBTC account to Karanjit's Kraken, who in turn sent nearly 11.6 in stolen Bitcoin to Jagroop's Kraken account, the report notes.

Multiple charges

Now the two alleged criminals are facing various counts, including one count each of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering, five counts of wire fraud, three counts of aggravated identity theft and multiple counts of money laundering. 

While Karanjit was reportedly arrested upon arrival at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas in July 2019, Jagroop still remains at large.

Earlier this month, major global crypto mining hardware supplier Bitmain accused a crypto project of falsely using its name to promote a product dubbed Mangocoin and sale a product dubbed “Bitmain Cloud Miner.”