Officials at the U.S. Department of Justice said they have frozen, seized and moved to forfeit more than $578 million in digital assets tied to criminal networks as part of a task force targeting Southeast Asian cryptocurrency-related fraud and scams. The Department’s notice said the funds were stolen by Chinese transnational criminal organizations that used websites and social media to target U.S. residents.
The actions were carried out by the District of Columbia’s Scam Center Strike Force, created by U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro in November. Pirro said seizures of cryptocurrency are a key part of the Strike Force’s work and that her office will pursue forfeiture through the legal process and seek to return funds to victims to the fullest extent possible.
Pirro’s statement indicated much of the seized crypto would not be diverted into the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and digital asset stockpile established by executive order in March 2025. Data from BitcoinTreasuries.NET suggests U.S. authorities may hold as many as 328,372 BTC through various criminal seizures, though the White House had not publicly commented on the size of the stockpile at the time of the notice.
Crypto scams surged in 2025. Blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis reported impersonation scams tied to crypto rose roughly 1,400% year over year in 2025, with many cases involving pig-butchering and fake investment schemes. The average amount stolen in impersonation scams increased about 600% over the same period.
Some perpetrators have been prosecuted. Earlier in the month, a judge sentenced an individual to 20 years in prison for orchestrating a pig-butchering scheme that stole more than $73 million, with many victims based in the U.S.
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