The Department of Justice has charged a Moroccan man with growing a spoof of neatly-liked marketplace OpenSea and selling off dozens of illicitly bought NFTs.
Soufiane Oulahyane, 25, allegedly paid for classified ads that placed his watch-alike OpenSea net space first on search engine results for “OpenSea” after which lured people at give up the keys to their non-public crypto wallets, based totally on a DOJ assertion.
“‘Spoofing’ is one amongst the oldest tricks in the prison playbook. Oulahyane adapted this frail tool to be used in a original and growing arena—the crypto space,” Damian Williams, the U.S. District Criminal legit for the Southern District of Recent York, acknowledged in the assertion.
By this alleged exploit, Oulahyane reportedly stole $450,000 in non-fungible tokens and cryptocurrency from a Prolonged island-based mostly victim in 2021.
In total, Oulahyane sold 39 of the illicitly bought NFTs, including a token from the Bored Ape Yacht Club series, BAYC #7358, which the victim bought for 49 Ether, a Meebit bought for 9.88 Ether, a Bored Ape Kennel Club NFT bought for six Ether, and an NFT from the CryptoDad series bought for 1.789 Ether.
Oulahyane is at notify in custody in Morocco. He became as soon as charged with wire fraud, using an unauthorized win entry to instrument, aggravated identity theft, and affecting transactions with an win entry to instrument to ranking one thing of fee that is the identical as or greater than $1,000. Oulahyane would possibly perhaps presumably be going via a protracted time in penal advanced if he’s came all over guilty.
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