Cryptocurrency fraud | Two South African brothers vanish with $3.6 billion in Bitcoin

Image Source: Reuters

AfriCrypt, a South African investment company, has reportedly defrauded investors of $3.6 billion in Bitcoin funds. The two brothers and founders of the investment platform have now fled the country, Bloomberg reported.

The South African police force, Hawks, was alerted after a Cape Town law firm Hanekom Attorneys, hired by investors said they were unable to trace the two brothers. It further told other cryptocurrency exchanges around the world if the brothers try to convert the digital coins to cash.

Africrypt Chief Operating Officer Ameer Cajee, 17, and his brother Raees, 20, had set up Africrypt in 2019 and it provided bumper returns for investors, the report said. The company website was taken down and the publication was unable to reach neither of the brothers through calls.

Reportedly, the signs of trouble started in April when Cajee, the elder brother, said that the company had become a victim of hacking and asked the clients not to report the incident to the authorities claiming it would decelerate the process of recovery of missing funds.

"We were immediately suspicious as the announcement implored investors not to take legal action," Hanekom Attorneys said in response to emailed questions to the publication. "Africrypt employees lost access to the back-end platforms seven days before the alleged hack."

It further said that the coins from client's wallets and funds from South Africa were passed through tumblers and mixers or to other large pools of bitcoin to make them untraceable.

The Gauteng South High Court, South Africa, granted a provisional liquidation order against the two brothers and gave them until 19 July 2021 to argue against the liquidation, Kenyan news site BitcoinKE reported.