DIGITAL LIFE

Fake euro swaps bitcoin on dark web: 'millionaire' gang arrested in Europe

The Portuguese Judiciary Police and Europol arrested one of Europe's largest counterfeiting gangs. The group sold counterfeit euro banknotes through dark web negotiations and received the payment in virtual currency, the bitcoin.
Police in Portugal seized almost 70,000 euros in counterfeit notes, in addition to various purposes that were used for production, such as printers, computers, paper with security filament simulations and holographic stickers. The "quality" of the ballots impressed the investigators.
"In addition to holograms, the notes also have the imitation of ink and the presence of watermark. These are notes with many security features included, it is one of the highest quality counterfeits seized in Europe," said expert Manuel Mourato during a press conference. Press
Five people were arrested. The group's leader, a 35-year-old Portuguese, was discovered in Colombia and extradited. According to police, the man advertised counterfeit notes in a kind of market on the dark web. It then passed orders to the other four members of the gang, which began production in Portugal. Once ready, the fake notes were mailed.
According to the researchers, this is the second largest gang of currency counterfeiters marketed by the dark web, which has been operating since at least 2017.
Adding the Portuguese apprehension to others already in the European registers of banknotes with the same characteristics, the gang was responsible for the production of 1 million and 300 thousand euros in fake banknotes, found mainly in France, Germany and Spain and Portugal.
Police say there are still many hundreds of counterfeit notes made by the gang circulating throughout Europe.
"Often they are only detected when entering bank deposits. In terms of normal trade, they are banknotes that pass quite easily. For those who detect counterfeit banknotes, the first warning is not to try to pass to someone else, because this is a crime in Afterwards, it is to go to the authorities to report and under what circumstances they received them ", warns the coordinator of criminal investigation of the Judiciary Police, Luís Ribeiro

RIA Novosti/mundophone