It’s very ovio that everybody knows the Wolf of Wall Street but today you would get to know the Crocodile of Wall Street. Yeah yeah you read that right !!!
Ridiculous, I know. But fantasizing isn’t it ?
You would definitely be even more curious when this self-proclaimed ‘crocodile of wall street’ turned out to be the Mastermind behind the greatest crypto heist.
The Mastermind behind the 2016 Bitfinex Crypto hack is moonlighted as a Rapper and a former Forbes Writer. The Mastermind is Heather R Morgan whose bio, described as ‘an expert in persuasion, social engineering, and game theory’ lives a double life.
Heather, an economist and author who formerly worked in foreign economies, provides economic consulting advice to Silicon Valley startups. When Bitfinex was hacked in 2016, Bitgo was the wallet solution provider. Heather Rehyan then shared her expertise of cybercrime and security with Bitgo’s Chief Compliance Officer, Matt Parella.
Ilya ‘Dutch’ Lichtenstein, 34, holds a dual U.S. and Russian citizenship and his wife, Heather Rhiannon Morgan, 31, a U.S citizen who raps by the moniker ‘Razzlekhan’, were detained on federal counts of money laundering and defrauding the United States on Tuesday in Manhattan.
The Fantasy of Perfect Felony
The husband-wife duo were arrested by the Department of Justice for allegedly attempting to launder more than 25,000 Bitcoins stolen in the 2016 hack of Hong Kong-based cryptocurrency exchange Bitfinex. What we didn’t realize at the time was that Morgan’s social media profiles were also being used to publicize her rap career, which was a far more heinous crime.
Rather than being charged with hacking, Lichtenstein and Morgan have been charged with receiving and laundering stolen funds. The complaint was filed in federal court in Washington, D.C. Federal law enforcement officials claimed they seized over $3.6 billion in bitcoin tied to the Bitfinex hack, a virtual currency exchange whose systems were compromised nearly six years ago.
According to the press release, the value of bitcoin at the time it was discovered was the greatest crypto seizure ever made by the Department of Justice. The value of the stolen Bitcoin was estimated to be around $4.5 billion. Yes, we’re talking billions with a “B” here !!!
Because of the corona pandemic, “cybercriminals and fraudsters are taking advantage of this unexpected disruption, leading to a spike in scams and cybercrime,” this Genghis Khan “but with more pizzazz” wrote in June 2020. She had another side gig in which she advised clients on how to write ‘cold emails.’
AlphaBay and Afar
The Bitfinex hack in August 2016 was one of the biggest cryptocurrency thefts ever, with news of the crime knocking 20% off Bitcoin’s value at the time. ‘The FBI and federal prosecutors were able to trace the transfer of Bitcoin from this hack, according to the complaint,’ said Matthew Graves, the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. He went on to say that the funds passed through a large darknet exchange linked to a slew of criminal activities, as well as cryptocurrency addresses linked to child sexual abuse items and converting into other types of crypto like monero.
“U.S. authorities traced the stolen assets on the BTC blockchain,” according to an accompanying statement of facts, as proceeds from the theft migrated from the first recipient wallet to accounts purportedly held by Lichtenstein and Morgan.
Investigators then tracked the funds to an account on the controversial dark market AlphaBay, an online forum shut down by law enforcement in 2017. Investigators claim to have “tracked the stolen money on its convoluted route from AlphaBay through a labyrinth of virtual currency exchanges and wallets based in the US and overseas” , in an attempt to launder the proceeds.
After decrypting a file “uploaded to Lichtenstein’s cloud storage account,” which included 2,000 crypto wallet addresses and associated private keys, law enforcement investigators were able to access the initial recipient wallet, named Wallet 1CGA4s. Per the statement, “blockchain research proved that almost all of those wallets were directly linked to the breach.” But the fact that they had full control over the private keys certainly implies some involvement.
Dyad of Entrepreneurship and Raunchy Videos
I guess we’ve reached the pinnacle of capitalist insanity. How come you’re worth billions but can’t get any clout as an influencer? You must be the most despised person on the face of the earth. I’m at a loss for words to describe how I feel: afraid, bewildered, worried, sad, disgusted, and yet I can’t turn away. It’s got to be the worst shaggy dog story indeed !!!
Assume we live in a world where matrix money can be stolen and returned only with warrants. Twitter users and journalists have already discovered what appear to be multiple profiles belonging to Morgan, who was allegedly pursuing a career as an influencer prior to her detention. Heather R Morgan’s Forbes contributor website contains a number of articles, including one titled “Experts Share Tips to Protect Your Business From Cybercriminals.”
Heather Morgan, better known by her moniker Razzlekhan, is an international economist and B2B software investor. Persuasion, social engineering, and game theory are all areas in which she excels. Morgan is the co-founder and CEO of Endpass, a company that employs artificial intelligence (AI) to automate identity verification and detect fraud before it happens. She enjoys rapping and designing streetwear apparel when she isn’t reverse-engineering. More fearless and more Such Truly Cynistic Personality !!!
The ‘Hipster couple,’ Morgan and Lichtenstein, appear to have a background in finance, and the DOJ claims they were able to conceal their money trail by employing “sophisticated laundering techniques,” such as using fictitious identities to open online accounts, automating transactions through computer programmes, and “chain hopping,” or rapidly exchanging one cryptocurrency for another.
Heather Morgan, a surrealist artist, SaaS investor and a few contradictory other things regards herself as a serial entrepreneur. When not shifting around the whooping $3.6 billion in cryptocurrency she makes music videos for rap songs as “Razzlekhan”. Her encounters with rappers Awkwafina and Mickey Avalon were the catalysts for her to pursue rapping and form Razzlekhan.
She even designs apparel, and creates multimedia art mixing painting, collage, and sculpture with technology when she isn’t coaching entrepreneurs about dark market’s new ways to tackle fraud and cybercrime. While her husband Lichtenstein said he was a “tech entrepreneur, explorer, and occasional magician.
The moonstruck couple majorly spent the illegal gains on a variety of items, including gold and non-fungible tokens, as well as ‘completely banal things like purchasing a $500 Walmart gift card.’ Brutal truth indeed..!! I mean blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.
LinkedIn profiles reveal Heather R. Morgan and Dutch Ilya Lichtenstein have been identified as SalesFolk employees since 2009 and 2014, respectively. Morgan’s LinkedIn page indicates that she was a former journalist for Inc. Magazine and Forbes, while Lichtenstein’s resume includes previous positions at MixRank, Endpass, and 500 Startups. The cringey Tik Toker was even a guest speaker at a Ted-Talk like event in which she discussed “how to social engineer your way into anything.”
Heather describes how social engineering succeeds by “triggering individuals to perform what they’re already wired to do,” as she puts it. She cites real-life examples of how she used social engineering strategies to get a security guard to give her and her friends a tour of a restricted location in Egypt.
Perhaps, the fraud tackling and cybercrime coaching takes up most of Morgan’s time, leaving little time for her to learn how to write or play music in a pleasing approach. Morgan’s rap videos are interspersed among unboxing clips and a review of 13 various kinds of aluminum-free deodorant on her YouTube profile.
Morgan, the self-proclaimed “Crocodile of Wall Street,” claims to have synesthesia, which causes her to see things in different ways and her “Art” often resembles something between an acid trip and a lovely nightmare.
If you’ve seen “Cutthroat Country,” you’ve seen Morgan’s diverse range of skills as a rapper. Her delivery is monotone, the bars are schadenfreude, and the music video that goes with it isn’t much better. But the funniest part is that Morgan appears to be involved in the same money laundering scam that she is accused of. “Spearfish your password / all your funds transferred,” is what the rap says.
Her style has been labeled as ‘sexy horror comedy,’ because of her passion for merging dark and scary topics with “inappropriate innuendos.” Razzlekhan writes on her personal website, comparing herself to “Genghis Khan, but with more pizzazz.” Such ridiculous extravaganzas, perhaps the most hilarious TikTok of them all would be Morgan explaining how she built her “multimillion-dollar business.”
Nonetheless, “Versace Bedouin,” a “rap anthem for misfits and weirdos,” may be her magnanimous achievement. In a YouTube description for her “Rap Anthem for Misfits & Weirdos,” Razzlekhan says, “This song embodies who I am: a badass CEO and female rapper, ready to take on Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and any other place that oppresses individual individuality and self expression.”
Morgan and her husband are accused of laundering billions of dollars in Bitcoin, although the footage appears to be worth nickels and dimes.
Heather clearly isn’t a stewpid. Her manner of speaking and reasoning about her field of knowledge demonstrates that she has good social skills, a sense of humor, and humility. Her own artistic endeavors prompted her to be more fearless than ever before, taking on huge software firms, healthcare, and finance.
Corollary
Committing a heist requires a lot of luck as is, but maintaining a public profile for nearly 6 years and then seeing that sum of money multiply into meteoric numbers?
It’s safe to say this is the craziest story in all of 2022 so far .
Officials with the Justice Department warn that while the rise of cryptocurrencies and virtual currency exchanges is a positive trend, it has also been accompanied by money laundering, malware, and other criminal activity. The recovery of more than $3.6 billion in stolen Bitcoin is the largest single money seizure in Department of Justice history. It proves that cryptocurrency is “not a safe haven for criminals,” according to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco.
Cashing Out Pseudo Anonymised Bitcoins Often Leaves a Trail, Thanks to Blockchain. The Married Couple With A Horrendous Internet History will be placed under house arrest with electronic surveillance and will be prohibited from transacting in cryptocurrency until their case is resolved.
Anirudh Bansal, the couple’s defense counsel, also claimed that both Lichtenstein and Morgan had been under investigation since November but stayed in the United States. The maximum prison penalties for conspiracy to launder money and defraud the United States are 20 years and five years, respectively.
They stole millions, which increased to billions, but they stayed in the States and waited to be caught? All of this for absolutely Nothing !!!?
