The United States Secret Service has charged Olamide Shanu, a 32-year-old Nigerian, with blackmail.
His Binance account was also taken away because it was allegedly used to hide the money from a shady scheme.
Court documents obtained by the Techpression sources show that Olamide Shanu is charged with 13 crimes in the United States. He allegedly forced a minor in the US to send him money by getting sexy pictures of the child in a sketchy way.
These include conspiracy to commit wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, conspiracy to commit extortion, interstate communication with intent to commit extortion, fraud, and money laundering. He would have to give the US government property that he got illegally.
Read also: Nigerian Police arrests alleged Bitcoin fraudster, Wilfred Bonse
Claims of a blackmail scandal
The report says that Olamide made a fake Snapchat account where he traded naked pictures with his victim. In the end, Olamide will tell the victim that if they don’t send him money, the naked pictures will be shared all over the internet. In the end, Olamide is said to have gotten a total of $1000 by lying and using a fake name.
Unfortunately for him, the victim reported the incident to his mother, who notified the authorities. He finally shut down Olamide’s fake account, but Olamide Shanu later added him with a new fake account and kept blackmailing him.
In the end, the IP addresses of Olamide Shanu’s two fake Snapchat accounts were found to be connected to the same place in Lagos, Nigeria.
Prosecutors said that more evidence showed Olamide had other underage victims from whom he had stolen a total of $1500. He was also accused of using one of the victims’ Venmo accounts to receive money for illegal activities.
After authorities showed Binance a warrant to get Shanu’s wallet information, investigations showed that payments from this Venmo account were sent to a cryptocurrency wallet that could be linked to him.
How Olamide Shanu was identified through a Binance account
Binance knows much about its users because it is a centralized cryptocurrency exchange with a Know-Your-Customer (KYC) feature. The US Secret Service was able to connect Olamide Shanu’s Binance account to the wallet address that was used to receive money from the Venmo account.
When the police asked for the account’s KYC information, they found Shanu’s Nigerian passport linked to it as the owner, along with his email address, olamideshanu011@gmail.com.
Also, the IP address used to access the Binance account was the same as that that Olamide Shanu used for his blackmail campaign on Snapchat. It proves he is connected to both accounts and responsible for the accusations.
The report shows that Olamide Shanu’s account, which had 0 BTC at trial, received over 84.66478598 Bitcoin (approximately $2.6 million) and withdrawn $2.5 million over three years.
Investigators obtained a warrant for Shanu’s Gmail account and found several photos on his Google account that matched his Binance passport photo.
EFCC nabs unlicensed forex dealer over alleged N2 billion fraud in Lagos
What is next?
Olamide Shanu may not be aware of the US authorities’ allegations, even though the details are public. Investigators tried to reach him via his Binance account’s phone line but failed.
If found guilty of the 13 indictment charges, which include conspiracy to commit wire fraud, aggravated identity theft, extortion, interstate communication with intent to extort, and money laundering forfeiture, he would have to surrender assets obtained fraudulently to the US government.
