Bitcoin (BTC) holders aren’t the only ones threatened with kidnapping attempts – stablecoin advocates are also falling victim to opportunistic attackers hoping to get their hands on those coins.

According to Hong Kong-based outlet Ta Kung Pao, criminals continue to target traders in in-person (OTC) transactions – the latest attack involving a crypto trader with large funds (USDT) was hospitalized after an attack, with seven people arrested.

Police said they were looking for “at least seven or eight” other suspects in connection with the alleged crime.

In what the outlet called a “shocking” case somewhat reminiscent of a recent incident in Spain, an unnamed “full-time” crypto trader (39) with some $ 3.1 million in tokens in exchange wallets, met a person who apparently masqueraded as a bona fide crypto buyer in a deal to sell the latter for US $ 0.5 million USDT. The trader met the “buyer” at an industrial building unit in Hong Kong’s Kowloon Bay, where the victim was allegedly ambushed and taken to a separate residential area where she was “forced to hand over her cell phone. , his online bank account login details and crypto exchange passwords. The attackers appear to have resorted to violence, repeatedly hitting the victim and using “hammers and other tools” to inflict pain and injuries – leaving the trader with “multiple fractures to his hands and feet and serious physical injuries”.

The alleged kidnappers attempted to contact the victim’s family and extort a ransom of around $ 4.7 million for the trader’s release. The family, according to police, refused to pay and on November 12 the trader managed to escape by crawling through a “narrow attic window”.

Police tracked down the shopkeeper soon after and entered the premises where the victim had been held, arresting two suspects on the spot.

Officers said the suspects (six men and one woman) all had “gang backgrounds” and were variously unemployed or working in the restaurant, transportation and automotive industries.

Police arrested the group for kidnapping and conspiracy to kidnap and said the victim suffered “non-life threatening injuries”.

However, the story may not have a happy ending: when the trader tried to access his trading platform account, he found that it had been locked and the password had been changed. . It is possible, the outlet concluded, “that every $ 3.1 million [worth of coins] in the wallet “had already” been transferred “.
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