The head of a South Korean illegal cryptocurrency exchange was sentenced to five years in prison for money laundering

According to DLNews, the Daegu District Court in South Korea sentenced the 41-year-old head of an illegal cryptocurrency exchange to five years in prison for laundering $1 million for an overseas voice scam gang using USDT. A 35-year-old employee of the exchange was also sentenced to two years and eight months in prison.

The criminal gang contacted victims via Telegram, posing as law enforcement and family members to trick them into transferring money, which was then quickly exchanged for USDT, all within an hour, preventing banks from freezing the accounts in time. Judge Lee Yong-cheol described this as a "serious crime" and pointed out that the defendant took no measures to compensate the victims for their losses. South Korean lawmaker Kim Seong-jun called for stronger regulation of stablecoins to address new types of foreign exchange crimes.