A U.S. federal judge has ordered crypto platform Debiex to pay approximately $2.5 million after it failed to respond to a Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) lawsuit accusing it of operating a romance scam that stole millions from victims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On March 13, Arizona Judge Douglas Rayes ruled in favor of the CFTC\u2019s motion for summary judgment, requiring Debiex to repay roughly $2.26 million to defrauded customers and pay a civil penalty of nearly $221,500.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Judge Rayes stated there was no indication that Debiex\u2019s failure to respond to the lawsuit was due to \u201cexcusable neglect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The CFTC filed its lawsuit in January 2024, alleging that Debiex orchestrated a \u201cpig butchering\u201d scam\u2014a scheme where fraudsters build romantic relationships with victims online to manipulate them into fraudulent investments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
According to the CFTC, Debiex\u2019s operators posed as successful crypto traders, gaining victims\u2019 trust through social media interactions before convincing them to invest. At least five victims were lured into depositing around $2.3 million into Debiex, which the platform then stole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The CFTC also accused Zh\u0101ng Ch\u00e9ng Y\u00e1ng of acting as a \u201cmoney mule\u201d for Debiex, using his crypto wallet to receive and launder stolen funds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On March 12, Judge Rayes granted a default judgment against Zh\u0101ng, ruling that the CFTC had sufficiently demonstrated his control over an OKX wallet that contained fraudulently obtained assets. OKX had been \u201cvoluntarily preserving\u201d the contents of Zh\u0101ng\u2019s wallet, which included nearly 63 Ether (valued at around $119,500) and $5.70 in Tether. The judge ordered these assets to be transferred to an unnamed victim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Debiex falsely marketed itself as a \u201cBlockchain Network Decentralized perpetual contract trading platform,\u201d promoting futures trading and mining transactions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The CFTC revealed that scammers impersonated women, engaging in ongoing conversations with victims and sharing fake personal photos to build trust. Once victims deposited crypto into their accounts, Debiex manipulated account balances, showing fictitious profits and trading positions to encourage further investments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAll of this information was most likely false,\u201d the CFTC stated, adding that customer funds were transferred across multiple wallets to conceal their true destination.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Federal Judge Rules Against Debiex in \u2018Pig Butchering\u2019 Romance Scam A U.S. federal judge has ordered crypto platform Debiex to pay approximately $2.5 million after it failed to respond to a Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) lawsuit accusing it of operating a romance scam that stole millions from victims. On March 13, Arizona Judge Douglas […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":11768,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,2,40],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-13971","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-exchange","8":"category-featured","9":"category-regulation"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n