A man in Aurora, Colorado has been accused of stealing roughly $9 million in crypto funds. 31-year-old Mark Shin has been charged with theft, cybercrime, and money laundering at the time of writing for allegedly taking part in a scheme back in April of 2020 through his home computer.
Mark Shin: Stealer or Advantage Taker?
Shin is believed to have noticed an “unintended vulnerability in the revision 9 update” of the ICON Nation cryptocurrency. Instead of reporting this to ICON Foundation/Nation, court documents allege that Shin took part in a scheme that ultimately drained the network and made him an instant digital millionaire. The documents state:
Shin changed the vote/select delegate function 558 times over an 11-hour period to mint unauthorized ICX. From his personal computer, Shin minted and stole from the ICON Nation approximately 13,924,045 unauthorized ICX, which was roughly the equivalent of approximately $8,988,406.00 U.S. dollars at the time of the attack.
Chris Decker, a defense attorney, issued the following statement regarding his feelings on the case:
I love this case. I think it’s fascinating.
Shin is arguing that he did not engage in thievery, but rather saw a “golden opportunity” and chose to take advantage. Decker said of the matter:
Mr. Shin utilized the code that was written by this cryptocurrency to create his own mint or mint his own currency. So, he wasn’t taking property of another. He was creating new currency.
George Brachler – legal analyst and former 18th Judicial District attorney – said this case is baffling and nothing like what he’s ever seen in nearly 30 years of serving the law. He said:
I’ve only been doing this (legal work) [for] 28 years. I’ve never seen a case quite like this.
He was also quick to say that he doesn’t think Shin’s argument of just trying to mint a new currency is going to be successful. He commented:
I don’t think it will because he acts guilty. I mean, this guy doesn’t act like what he’s doing is above board. He creates a bunch of different accounts. He tries to take the cryptocurrency that he has ‘minted’ and sends it around to other crypto wallets to try to disguise who’s the owner and how much he has.
Prosecutors are claiming that Shin used a spinning service called Tornado Cash to move all the money into other wallets to disguise where they originated from. Tornado Cash, at the time of writing, has been used to launder at least $7 billion. Shin said:
The fact that I moved the money immediately after that is of no consequence to the fact that I minted it, and I didn’t steal it.
This Argument May Not Work
Decker finished with:
I think that this act undermines a general concern that people don’t quite understand how these programs work.
