James Cirrone

Following more than two years of investigation, Israeli police told prosecutors that they should charge Moshe Hogeg, a businessman behind a number of crypto startups over the years, for his role in an alleged $290 million crypto scam.&nbsp;



The police claim that Hogeg raised the inordinate sum of money from Israelis and investors across the world with the pretense of funding four separate crypto projects, the Times of Israel <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/police-seek-charges-in-fraud-case-against-crypto-businessman-moshe-hogeg/">reported</a> Wednesday. Instead of doing that, Hogeg lined his own pockets during 2017 and 2018, the police say.&nbsp;



Hogeg was involved in a project with blockchain smartphone startup Sirin Labs. While Sirin Labs is still afloat and selling phones, Hogeg was sued by Foxconn for nearly $6 million in 2020 for not paying manufacturing bills.&nbsp;



Police interviewed around 180 people who were involved. Their dozens of searches yielded 900 pieces of evidence, money and property, the Times of Israel reported.&nbsp;



Following their investigation, police have leveled multiple accusations against Hogeg. These include aggravated fraud, unauthorized theft, falsification of corporate documents, forgery, money laundering, and tax violations, among others.



Hogeg’s troubles with Israeli authorities began in 2021 when he was arrested after police suspected his involvement in fraud and sex crimes. Hogeg, who was released into house arrest a month later, denies all the accusations against him.



Hogeg’s most recent involvement in the crypto space appears to be with Tomi, a Web3 company focused on decentralization and free speech. Hogeg identifies himself as a cofounder of Tomi, and in a <a href="https://twitter.com/moshehogeg/status/1683127139812405248">post</a> on X from July, added that he would “remain an advisor and investor.”







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Israeli police say Moshe Hogeg engaged in $290M crypto fraud, recommend charges

Sebastian Sinclair

David Canellis

<div id="highlights-block_6315b5cb2096f" class="highlights">
 <ul>
 <li>This is the third hack in one week for South Korea&#8217;s official social media channels</li>
 <li>Google Korea is now investigating most recent YouTube incident along with Seoul’s cyber crimes unit</li>
 </ul>
 
</div>



Crypto fraudsters reveled over the weekend, hijacking an official South Korean government YouTube channel alongside accounting giant PwC’s Twitter account to promote scams. 



South Korea’s Youtube channel was commandeered on Saturday and renamed to “SpaceX Invest.” Hackers then broadcasted a crypto-related video followed by an interview with Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, <a href="https://en.yna.co.kr/view/AEN20220903001700325" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Yonhap News</a> reported.



Around the same time, the Venezuelan arm of PwC’s Twitter account was tweeting more than a dozen links to a classic crypto giveaway scam. 



The links led to a phony Ripple Labs website which encouraged users to send ripple (XRP) to a specific address, after which they were promised more in return. The account posted: &#8220;Want to see how #XRP will make you rich?&#8221; and &#8220;#XRP gogogo,&#8221; among other slogans.



It took at least eight hours for PwC Venezuela’s Twitter account to be cleaned up, while South Korea’s YouTube channel was restored after about four hours. Google Korea and Seoul’s cyber crimes unit are now reportedly investigating the incident.&nbsp;



The hack is the third such instance against South Korea’s official YouTube channels in a week, with one operated by the Korea Tourism Organization illegitimately operated last Thursday and Friday.



A YouTube channel belonging to South Korea’s National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art was also compromised on Thursday, <a href="https://www.koreaherald.com/view.php?ud=20220904000123" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">The Korea Herald</a> reported.



Twitter and YouTube have <a href="https://www.tenable.com/blog/fake-bitcoin-ethereum-dogecoin-cardano-ripple-and-shiba-inu-giveaways-proliferate-on-youtube" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">long been critised</a> as platforms for the promotion of crypto scams, <a href="https://thenextweb.com/news/twitter-cryptocurrency-musk-ethereum" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">stretching</a> all the way back to 2018. The ruses commonly leverage likenesses of unwitting celebrities including MicroStrategy’s Michael Saylor and Ethereum’s Vitalik Buterin.



Musk <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-61749120">called out</a> YouTube earlier this year, claiming it was not doing enough to tackle fake advertisements using his identity to promote crypto giveaway scams. 



While not a giveaway scam, cybersecurity researchers <a href="https://threatpost.com/musk-spacex-cryptoscam-youtube-advertising/167219/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">detailed</a> a recent fraud campaign purchasing legitimate YouTube advertisements for dodgy ‘SpaceX’ themed tokens, purchasable via Uniswap. YouTube said in June that it removes channels reported to be advertising crypto scams.



At the height of public interest in crypto beginning this year, Meta’s social media platform Facebook was also targeted by hackers for roughly the <a href="https://cms.blockworks.co/australian-billionaire-brings-criminal-case-against-facebook-over-fake-crypto-ads/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">same purpose</a> — to swindle capital from prospective crypto investors.



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Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/empire">Subscribe to the Empire newsletter</a>.



Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin. <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/onthemargin">Subscribe to the Forward Guidance newsletter</a>.



Get alpha directly in your inbox with the <a href="https://blockworks.co/newsletter/research">0xResearch newsletter</a> — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.



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