Minecraft-spawned crypto kingpin faces 20 years for $245 million heist — mastermind's role in hacking campaign fueled their supercar, bodyguards, and private jet habit

The ringleader of a cybercrime gang, which reportedly formed after meetups in Minecraft online, has pleaded guilty to a racketeering charge. Sentencing is yet to be finalized, but 22-year-old Singaporean and Miami resident Malone Lam could face 20 years behind bars. Lam is accused of helping to steal and launder hundreds of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency. Here are the full United States District Court for the District of Columbia documents (PDF), via The Register.

According to the court documents, Lam visited the U.S. to meet fellow Minecrafters Jeandiel Serrano and Veer Chetal, for the first time in real life, in 2023. Soon, Lam’s role in the cybercriminal gang seems to have become an important one. The Singaporean reportedly found high-net-worth crypto holders to target, supported social engineering operations, leveraged technology to trigger account access alerts on target devices, and was involved in laundering the pilfered digital booty.

Lam’s crypto fraud gang reportedly totaled 12 members, and this criminal fraternity operated for about two years. Documents indicate that the individual crypto thefts ranged from $800,000 to tens of millions of dollars. One crypto heist purportedly netted $245 million from a single victim.