According to Bloomberg, German police confiscated Bitcoin worth $2.17 billion during an investigation into the pirated movie website movie2k.to. agencies This is the largest seizure of Bitcoin by law enforcement in Germany to date.
According to NYTimes, two German men (40 years old and 37 years old) were investigated for managing the pirated movie website movie2k.to more than 10 years ago and using the profits earned to buy Bitcoin. From 2008 – 2013, this website hosted more than 880,000 pirated movies in many different languages. reports According to news at the time, users from all over the world visited the website, making it one of the 25 most visited websites in Germany. After being shut down by authorities in 2013, several websites with similar names were created as replacements.
In addition to illegal commercial exploitation of copyright works, the two suspects are also involved in money laundering activities. However, police have not yet filed formal charges.
One of the two people voluntarily transferred 50,000 Bitcoin to a wallet owned by the German federal police. Kay Anders – spokeswoman for the Saxony state police (Germany) said the above amount will stay in the government’s account until the court decides how to handle it.
In the past, many criminals converted money of illegal origin into Bitcoin to avoid detection by authorities. Cryptocurrencies can be stored in private digital wallets or on physical hard drives without the supervision of any bank, making them harder to confiscate. But in recent years, authorities have developed technology to track the flow of digital money and determine the identity of anonymous accounts.
This is not the first time German authorities have confiscated a large amount of Bitcoin. In 2022, a programmer who worked for movie2k.to hand over $27 million in Bitcoin before being tried. That amount was classified by the police as compensation for damages.