The United States Secret Service has seized the website of Russian exchange Garantex in collaboration with the DOJ’s Criminal Division, FBI, and Europol. The exchange had ties to illicit activities, providing services to ransomware hackers and darknet markets.
The official website now has a sign that says, “The domain of Garantex has been seized by the United States Secret Service under a seizure warrant.” The warrant was obtained by the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia.
In the message on the Garantex website, other law enforcement agencies including the Dutch National Police, the Frankfurt General Prosecutor’s Office, the Estonian National Criminal Police, the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation, and the German Federal Criminal Police Office were involved in the operation.
The exchange’s web domain now points to servers owned by the Secret Service, ns2.usssdomainseizure.com and ns1.usssdomainseizure.com. These servers also host seizure notices for various other websites closed by the agency.
Garantex has long been under the radar of authorities. Last month, the European Union sanctioned the exchange due to its close association with certain Russian banks, with the sanction coming three years after Russia’s conflict with Ukraine started. Similarly, the US Treasury sanctioned the exchange in 2022 for being associated with “illicit actors and darknet markets” such as Conti, a Russian ransomware gang, and Hydra, a darknet market.
Tether freezes USDT worth millions on Garantex
Earlier today, Tether froze $27 million worth of USDT on the exchange, leading to the exchange temporarily halting its services. The exchange announced its official Telegram channel. However, it did not mention the law enforcement operation. A machine translation of the announcement said, “We have bad news. Tether has entered the war against the Russian crypto market and blocked our wallets worth more than 2.5 billion rubles.”
Garantex also warned its users, saying, “all USDT in Russian wallets is currently under threat.” The exchange further said that it would not give up and continue fighting. Later, the exchange published a list of wallets blocked by Tether.
Even though it’s not a major exchange in Russia, the closure of Garantex will impact the Russian crypto market. The deputy head of the Russian parliament’s committee on information policy posted on his Telegram channel, “for sure not the last case when Western countries put pressure.” He further added that it is not possible for Western countries to fully “block this market for Russia.”