The criminals demanded a payment in virtual currency for $950k USD in exchange for releasing a businessman, who is still missing
Network security and ethical hacking
specialists from the International Institute of Cyber Security reported an
unusual incident. A criminal group kidnapped a businessman and, at the time of
demanding the ransom, they specified that the payment should be made through
the cryptocurrency known as Bitcoin.
The kidnapped businessman was identified as
William Sean Creighton Kopko, owner of an online gambling platform. The man was
reported missing in Costa Rica since last September 2018.
According to reports recovered by network security specialists, a dozen people have been arrested in connection with this
crime; the arrests were carried out by the police agencies of Spain and Costa
Rica.
Creighton Kopko’s family had to pay the
aforementioned ransom through a Bitcoin transaction valued at $950k USD,
however, once the transaction was completed, the kidnappers stopped
communicating with the victim’s family. To date, the businessman’s whereabouts
remain unknown.
According to the investigations, the kidnappers
would have fled from Costa Rica to Cuba and subsequently flew to Spain in
November 2018. Once they arrived in Spanish territory, the kidnappers would
have rented an apartment in Zaragoza, where they would be eventually arrested.
Multiple criminal groups have shown special
interest in the world of cryptocurrency, so the accumulation of Bitcoin has
become a serious matter, as mentioned by the specialists in network security.
According to reports from the authorities, this
same criminal group impersonated a team of students interested in learning
about virtual currencies to contact Bitcoin users, blackmailing and/or cheating
them to get access passwords to their online cryptocurrency wallets.
In recent times, there have been cases where,
in exchange for releasing a family hostage, criminal groups ask victims to pay
through this kind of virtual assets, hoping to maintain their anonymity to keep
the authorities away and, of course, keep committing crimes.
Cybersecurity experts from the International
Cyber Security Institute fear that such crimes will become a widely practiced
trend in the future.
