Liberty Reserve Founder Gets 20 Years For Money LaunderingLiberty Reserve Founder Gets 20 Years For Money Laundering
Convicted for virtual currencies laundering operations worth $8 billion.
May 9, 2016

Arthur Budovsky, 42, founder of digital currency empire Liberty Reserve, was sentenced to 20 years in prison and fined $500,000 Friday for running a massive money laundering enterprise used by cybercriminals worldwide.
The sentence was announced May 6 by Assistant Attorney General Leslie R. Caldwell for the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara for the Southern District of New York, accordingn to a press release.
The defendant, according to US attorney Bharara, violated US criminal laws by facilitating “money laundering on a massive scale for criminals around the globe” through virtual currencies. Transactions included trafficking the illegal proceeds of Ponzi schemes, credit card fraudsters and other criminal activities.
At the time of its forced shutdown in May 2013, the company was found to be operating 5.5 million user accounts, with more than 600,000 in the US alone, and had done around 78 million financial transactions totaling over $8 billion.
According to the press release, four co-defendants, Vladimir Kats, Azzeddine El Amine, Mark Marmilev and Maxim Chukharev, have already pleaded guilty. Marmilev and Chukharev were sentenced to five years and three years in prison, respectively. Charges remain pending against Liberty Reserve and two individual defendants who are fugitives.
For more details, click here.
About the Author(s)
You May Also Like
Hacking Your Digital Identity: How Cybercriminals Can and Will Get Around Your Authentication Methods
Oct 26, 2023Modern Supply Chain Security: Integrated, Interconnected, and Context-Driven
Nov 06, 2023How to Combat the Latest Cloud Security Threats
Nov 06, 2023Reducing Cyber Risk in Enterprise Email Systems: It's Not Just Spam and Phishing
Nov 01, 2023SecOps & DevSecOps in the Cloud
Nov 06, 2023