Administrador de Liberty Reserve Arthur Budovsky Belanchuk detenido en Costa Rica – Video


Administrador de Liberty Reserve Arthur Budovsky Belanchuk detenido en Costa Rica
Ver noticia completa: http://tradingenlinea.blogspot.com/2013/05/detienen-dos-empresarios-acusados-de.html Noticia de detencin del presunto dueo y administ...

By: Tradingenlinea

Read the original post:

Administrador de Liberty Reserve Arthur Budovsky Belanchuk detenido en Costa Rica - Video

Liberty Reserve: Legit E-Currency, or 'Bank of Choice for the Criminal Underworld'?

Reuters

When the US government stepped up enforcement of anti-money laundering rules against Mt. Gox, the world's largest bitcoin exchange, experts recalled a 2009 episode when another online exchange, E-Gold, was shut down for similar violations. Get ready for deja vu all over again: Two of the men convicted in connection with the E-Gold investigation were arrested last week as the Manhattan US Attorney (cooperating with law enforcement in 17 countries) prepared to indict a third digital currency trader, Liberty Reserve.

The Manhattan US Attorney isalleging that Liberty Reserve is a $6 billion money laundering schemeand has been authorized to seize its outstanding funds.

In the indictment, prosecutors call Liberty Reserve "the bank of choice for the criminal underworld." By simply providing an e-mail address, Liberty Reserve customers could convert euros or US dollars into Liberty Reserve Dollars or Liberty Reserve Euros and transfer those funds to other real and digital financial institutions without a paper trail. Prosecutors say the company has moved funds associated with crimes including credit card fraud, identity theft and narcotics trafficking.

A public service warning for criminals and others in the financial industry: the government is capable of monitoring your communications.

Failing to comply with money transmission rules--which require almost any company that sends money to know their customers and monitor large transactions--is a civil violation. But flouting the rules specifically to facilitate criminal activity is far more serious. No doubt Liberty Reserve account names like "Russia Hackers" will make the prosecutors' task easier. But it's unclear from the indictment whether they have enough incriminating evidence; during the E-Gold prosecution, some criminal charges were eventually dropped.

Liberty Reserve's founder, Arthur Budovsky, was convicted of violating money transmission rules at a company connected to E-Gold in 2006. Prosecutors allege that he sought to build a new underground financial network in Costa Rica, where he went to found the new company almost immediately after his conviction. In 2011, herelinquishedhis US citizenship in an attempt to avoid legalentanglementsthere.

When Costa Rican authorities declared his company in violation of money laundering rules in 2011, the entire company went "underground," according to the indictment, creating a computer portal that fed false data to the country's regulators while continuing to move millions through shell companies in Malaysia, Russia, Nigeria, Cyprus, Hong Kong and Australia.

See the article here:

Liberty Reserve: Legit E-Currency, or 'Bank of Choice for the Criminal Underworld'?

Liberty Reserve Charged With Money-Laundering Conspiracy

Liberty Reserve SA, whose operators are charged with running a scheme that masked more than $6 billion of criminal proceeds, was designed to help users evade scrutiny, U.S. prosecutors said.

The digital currency company, unlike traditional banks or legitimate online payment processors, didnt require users to validate their identity and allowed accounts to be opened under fictitious names such as Russia Hackers and Hacker Account, according to prosecutors.

An undercover agent was able to establish a Liberty Reserve account using the alias Joe Bogus, listing his address as 123 Fake Main Street in Completely Made Up City, New York, said Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara. He said the prosecution is believed to be the largest money-laundering case brought by the U.S.

Liberty Reserve, incorporated in Costa Rica in 2006, operated as essentially a black-market bank, Bharara said yesterday at a news conference announcing the unsealing of an indictment against the company and seven principals. The company, which operated as one of the worlds most widely used digital currency services, facilitated global criminal conduct and was created and structured as a criminal business venture, one designed to help criminals conduct illegal transactions, Bharara said.

Liberty Reserve, shut by the U.S. through criminal and civil enforcement actions, helped users launder illegal proceeds from crimes or transfer funds among associates, prosecutors said. Liberty Reserves digital currency was used by people committing identity theft, credit card fraud, computer hacking, child pornography and narcotics trafficking, prosecutors said.

Liberty Reserve had an estimated 1 million users around the world and conducted a total of about 55 million transactions -- virtually all of them illegal -- including 200,000 in the U.S., Bharara said. U.S. investigators have found that criminal rings that used Liberty Reserve to distribute illicit proceeds operated from Vietnam, Nigeria, Hong Kong, China and the U.S.

Its entire existence was based on a criminal business model, Bharara said at the news conference.

The global enforcement action that we announced today is an important step toward reining in the Wild West of illicit Internet banking, he said yesterday. As detailed in the indictment, Liberty Reserve was intentionally created and structured to facilitate criminal activity.

Officials said the case was a series of firsts for U.S. authorities. In addition to being the largest international money-laundering case brought by the Justice Department, it involved the first search warrant executed by American officials against a cloud-based server. Bharara said 30 search warrants were executed during an 18-month investigation.

Were now entering the cyber age of money-laundering, said Richard Weber, chief of the Internal Revenue Services Criminal Investigation division, who also alluded to Chicago Crime boss Al Capone. If Al Capone were alive today, this is how he would be hiding his money.

Originally posted here:

Liberty Reserve Charged With Money-Laundering Conspiracy

Liberty Reserve Founder Indicted on $6 Billion Money-Laundering Charges

The founder of digital currency system Liberty Reserve has been indicted in the United States along withsix other people in a$6 billion money-laundering scheme, in what authorities are calling the largest international money-laundering case ever prosecuted, according to documents unsealed today.

Dubbed the financial hub of the cyber-crime world, authorities say Liberty Reserve had more than 1 million users worldwide and processed more than 12 million transactions annually as the favored money-laundering service for carders, hackers and other cybercriminals in the digital underground who used it to transfer money around the world effortlessly and anonymously.

According to the indictment (.pdf), Liberty Reserve was used to launder more than $6 billion in criminal proceeds.

Arthur Budovsky, a Costa Rican citizen of Ukrainian origin, and the founder of the currency system, was arrested in Spain last Friday, while others were arrested in Costa Rica and New York. Police in Costa Rica also raided three homes and five businesses linked to Liberty Reserve, according to the Associated Press. The digital currencys site went offline last week, with its front page replaced by a notice saying that the domain had been seized by the United States Global Illicit Financial Team.

Budovskys fellow indictees include Vladimir Kats, Ahmed Yassine Abdelghani, Allan Esteban Hidalgo Jimenez, Azzeddine el Amine, Mark Marmilev and Maxim Chukharev. Authorities say Katz operated Liberty Reserve with Budovsky until the two had a falling-out in 2009.

Liberty Reserve was incorporated in Costa Rica in 2006 and had at least 200,000 customers in the U.S., but failed to register in the U.S. as a money-transmitting service.

Liberty Reserve required only a valid email address to open an account and initiate transactions. It charged a 1 percent fee for each transaction and, for an additional 75 cents, offered to hide a users account number in transactions.

Although the service had legitimate customers, the anonymity it provided attracted a large clientele from the criminal underground who relied on offshore Liberty Reserve currency exchangers to move their ill-gotten cash in and out of the financial system.

Through the defendants efforts, Liberty Reserve has emerged as one of the principal means by which cyber-criminals around the world distribute, store, and launder the proceeds of their illegal activity, authorities said in the indictment.

The service was allegedly favored by cybercriminals and mules who participated in a recent$45 million coordinated bank heist that involved laundering cash that was drained from two Middle Eastern banks via ATMs around the world.

Originally posted here:

Liberty Reserve Founder Indicted on $6 Billion Money-Laundering Charges

Liberty Reserve indicted for $6 billion in money laundering

The U.S. Department of Justice has indicted online payment processor Liberty Reserve for laundering $6 billion in a series of global transactions, which the agency charges may be the largest international money-laundering prosecution in history.

"Liberty Reserve was intentionally created and structured to facilitate criminal activity. It was essentially a black market bank," said Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District Court of New York, in a press conference Tuesday. "As alleged, it deliberately operated in a way to attract and aid criminals who wish to use digital currency to break the law and launder the proceeds of their crimes."

Liberty Reserve founder Arthur Budovsky was arrested in Brooklyn, New York, on Friday for operating an unlicensed money-transmitting business, along with six other company principals who were arrested in Brooklyn, Spain and Costa Rica.

The DOJ has shut down the Liberty Reserve service, seizing $25 million in funds. The law enforcement agency also seized five Internet domain names, including LibertyReserve.com and four related currency exchange sites. The LibertyReserve.com site went offline Thursday, with traffic first being redirected to a DOJ banner on Tuesday. In addition, 45 bank accounts were restrained or seized and a civil action was filed against 35 third-party exchange websites that operated on behalf of Liberty Reserve.

Helping the DOJ pursue the case were the U.S. Secret Service, the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the Department of the Treasury, as well as 17 law enforcement agencies from other countries.

"Our efforts shatter the belief among money launderers that what happens in cyberspace stays in cyberspace. No longer should they lull themselves into a false sense of security, thinking that the Internet provides absolute anonymity," said David Cohen, the Treasury Department's undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, also at the press conference.

Incorporated in Costa Rica in 2006, Liberty Reserve S.A. billed itself as a currency exchange, a service to send and receive payments from anywhere in the globe. It charged 1 percent of the money being exchanged as a fee, up to $2.99. Registering for the service required only a valid email address, along with a name and birthdate, which Liberty Reserve did not verify. The service had more than 1 million users worldwide, including 200,000 in the U.S. It processed more than 12 million transactions yearly, amounting to a value of more than $1.4 billion.

From 2006, the company processed more than 55 million transactions and transferred more than $6 billion in illegal funds, according to the DOJ. The company did not register itself with the DOJ as a money transferring business.

The DOJ charged that Budovsky and his co-conspirators "intentionally created, structured, and operated Liberty Reserve as a criminal business venture, one designed to help criminals conduct illegal transactions and launder the proceeds of their crimes," according to the indictment. In particular, the service was maintained so that individual transactions would be anonymous and untraceable.

Liberty Reserve did not accept transfers of money itself directly from its users. Instead, customers deployed pre-approved third party exchangers, which would buy and sell in bulk a Liberty Reserve currency called LR. Because Liberty Reserve was not keeping track of end users, it provided a layer of anonymity in its transactions. In addition to the Liberty Reserve fee, exchangers would also charge fees, which in many cases would run to 5 percent or more of the amount being transferred, which was more costly than most legal payment processors and banks.

See the article here:

Liberty Reserve indicted for $6 billion in money laundering

Liberty Reserve indicted on digital currency money-laundering charges

NEW YORK In what was described as the biggest-ever international money-laundering scheme, a federal grand jury has indicted a company on criminal charges that it used "virtual" currency to launder more than $6 billion in ill-gotten gains.

Liberty Reserve, a Costa Rica company founded in 2006, was so welcoming to criminals looking to cloak their identities that an undercover agent was able to register as "Joe Bogus," authorities said. The agent was then able to set up an account to supposedly rip off ATM customers and what he described as "for the cocaine." His purported address: 123 Fake Main St., Completely Made Up City, USA.

Among the world's largest Internet-based currency companies, Liberty Reserve amounted to a financial hub for the black market, becoming "the bank of choice for the criminal underworld," Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan, said Tuesday. The company allegedly provided anonymity for criminals looking to conceal illicit profits from drug-running, child porn and cyber crime such as credit card fraud and identity theft.

"Its entire existence was based on a criminal business model," Bharara said, adding that the indictment against Liberty Reserve and seven of its principals and employees is part of a broader effort to reign in "the Wild West of illicit Internet banking."

The case marks the latest black eye for the emerging world of virtual currencies and payment systems based on them. Virtual currency services have drawn growing interest from venture capitalists and entrepreneurs, who see them as an opportunity to revolutionize how people pay for just about everything. They believe such systems can dramatically lower the cost of doing business and make all types of finance far more efficient.

Chris Larsen, co-founder of virtual currency payment system OpenCoin, said such crackdowns are to be expected as entrepreneurs push the boundaries of these new payment systems.

"I think it's kind of a natural evolution," said Larsen, whose company has attracted investment from major Silicon Valley venture capital firms including Google Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. "These types of payment systems will go from zero people to everybody. And I think when people look under the hood, they'll get comfortable with it."

That was the case a decade ago, when PayPal first emerged. The online payment system drew heavy scrutiny from state banking commissions, and grappled with a reputation as a haven for porn companies and online gambling. Now, as a unit of EBay, PayPal has become part of the fabric of the Internet.

Among the new breed of financial companies, Bitcoin has probably drawn the most attention, in part because it is not a company. Instead, Bitcoin is a currency system that operates across a distributed network of servers controlled by no single organization, making it harder to regulate.

Regulators worry these new payment systems are creating a kind of lawless frontier, leaving the government scrambling to keep dirty money out of the U.S. financial system as transactions increasingly take place on the Internet, on mobile phones and even with newfangled cyber currencies.

Read the original:

Liberty Reserve indicted on digital currency money-laundering charges

Liberty Reserve's website cited anti-money laundering policy

By Matthew Goldstein

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Older versions of the website for Liberty Reserve, a company U.S. authorities claim was a money transfer hub for criminal gangs trafficking in drugs and child pornography, expressly said the firm "will not do business with anyone suspected of, or directly involved in money laundering."

U.S. prosecutors in an indictment unsealed on Tuesday said that is precisely what the Costa Rican-based Liberty Reserve was doing.

The website for Liberty Reserve has now been seized by the United States Global Illicit Financial Team and prominently displays logos for the Department of Justice, the Department of Treasury and the Secret Service.

But older versions of the firm's website, which can be found in the Internet Archive's Wayback machine (http://archive.org/web/web.php) offer a glimpse into Liberty Reserve's past, before most people had ever heard of it.

The versions say Liberty Reserve has the "right to refuse a transaction at any time should suspicion arise that it may be connected to money laundering or criminal activity." The policy also said the company would not do business with anyone using funds from "sources by an illegal activity."

The website provided instructions on how users of Liberty Reserve could go to a number of "exchangers," which the firm said, "will be happy to buy or sell your LR."

LR is how Liberty Reserve referred to its own form of digital currency that authorities say was used to enable criminals to launder money from illegal activities like selling drugs and child porn. The digital currency could be exchanged into cash.

The company also boasted of a product called "LibertyGuard", which it said was a plug-in on Firefox browsers that would ensure users' transactions were secure.

In connection with the indictment, authorities in Spain, Costa Rica and New York said they had arrested five people on Friday and seized bank accounts and Internet domains associated with the company, Liberty Reserve.

Link:

Liberty Reserve's website cited anti-money laundering policy

Mediterranean Palace Tenerife Canary islands Spain sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley 00312 – Video


Mediterranean Palace Tenerife Canary islands Spain sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley 00312
http://georgegodley.com/ http://www.youtube.com/geogodley https://twitter.com/geogodley https://www.facebook.com/pages/GeoGodley/213431738712281.

By: #9992; #9835; hearts; #13025; WORLD RECORD MULTI DAILY VLOG LIFELOG -george godley

Read the original here:

Mediterranean Palace Tenerife Canary islands Spain sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley 00312 - Video

canon s100 FAIL zoom sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley Tenerife Canary islands Spain MVI6579 – Video


canon s100 FAIL zoom sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley Tenerife Canary islands Spain MVI6579
http://georgegodley.com/ http://www.youtube.com/geogodley https://twitter.com/geogodley https://www.facebook.com/pages/GeoGodley/213431738712281.

By: #9992; #9835; hearts; #13025; WORLD RECORD MULTI DAILY VLOG LIFELOG -george godley

See original here:

canon s100 FAIL zoom sat 30 mar 2013 George Godley Tenerife Canary islands Spain MVI6579 - Video

Cook Islands: Statement made at the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction (2013) – Video


Cook Islands: Statement made at the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction (2013)
An Official Statement made by Mr Charlie Carlson, Director, Emergency Management Cook Islands (EMCI), Cook Islands, at the fourth session of the Global Platf...

By: UNISDR

See more here:

Cook Islands: Statement made at the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction (2013) - Video