Follow-Up: DOJ Scam Center Strike Force Charges Six Madagascar-Based Scammers in NFT Crypto Scheme Tied to China: More Than $1 Billion Restrained
U.S. Attorney Jeanine Ferris Pirro for the District of Columbia announced in Washington today that the Department of Justice's Scam Center Strike Force had unsealed charges against six Africa-based scammers with connections to Southeast Asia and China who targeted Americans with fake nonfungible token (NFT) investment scams. Chui Kok Wa was charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud as the leader of the NFT scheme, and Pirro called on the government of Madagascar to extradite the six charged defendants. Pirro also announced that the Strike Force has now restrained more than $1 billion in cryptocurrency from fraud schemes and is expanding its personnel and its reach to a global portfolio, following the expansion of Chinese-connected transnational criminal organizations to Africa and Europe.
As alleged in affidavits unsealed today, a criminal group with connections to Malaysia and China opened scam compounds in Madagascar in early 2025, likely having moved those operations from Cambodia after law enforcement action there. Scammers posed as beautiful women who met victims on dating websites and enlisted them to connect their cryptocurrency wallets to fraudulent websites associated with the NFT investments; once connected, the scammers induced victims to keep funding their wallets and then surreptitiously pulled the money out. FBI investigators identified approximately 74 cryptocurrency wallets associated with victims in Maryland, Oregon, Nevada and Minnesota who reported losses, and the stolen funds were moved to cryptocurrency accounts associated with Chinese-based actors. Wa's phones contained employment contracts detailing overnight work schedules in Madagascar corresponding to daytime and evening hours in the United States and bonus payments tied to money stolen, as well as scripts that told workers they were committing "an emotional scam, using the victim's feelings for us to get him to invest." The charges are allegations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
"Chinese TCOs are sending scammers into your dating network, your social network, and your messaging applications, all to steal Main Street America's bank accounts," Pirro said. "For the last year, the Strike Force has fought hard against the compounds in Southeast Asia facilitating these scammers, to the tune of $1 billion in cryptocurrency restrained." The Strike Force said it has restrained $1,006,460,156.82 in cryptocurrency-related fraud, seized 700 fraudulent crypto investment websites, seized Starlink terminals used by scam centers, and, working with private industry, identified millions of scam accounts on U.S. networks; Meta reports that 17.3 million scam accounts have been deplatformed in the last year.
Pirro also described setbacks in Madagascar: in August 2026 the FBI deployed a team at the invitation of Madagascar's Ministry of Justice and National Police to assist in taking down 13 scam compounds, where more than 3,200 electronic devices were seized, but the U.S. government was then stymied in its efforts to interview the individuals involved, and Madagascar repatriated numerous suspects to China before the investigation was complete. The government has obtained a material witness warrant to interview 15 employees of the scheme who say they were human trafficked and abused by Wa and are believed to be held in jail in Madagascar. The Strike Force was launched by Pirro in November 2025. According to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, reported losses from cryptocurrency investment fraud rose from $4.57 billion in 2023 to $8.65 billion in 2025, an increase of 89 percent. Pirro also announced two other Strike Force actions from the past year: the charging in South Africa of a prolific sextortionist accused of extorting at least 54 victims, and, with the Nigerian Police Force and a referral from Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit, the arrest of three key players behind the RaccoonO365 phishing kit, which facilitated the theft of at least 5,000 credentials from 94 countries and disrupted critical surgical care at U.S. hospitals.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：比特币实体币置于笔记本电脑键盘上资料图，与本案被告人无关。照片：Satheesh Sankaran，CC BY 2.0（经 Wikimedia Commons） / A physical Bitcoin token on a laptop keyboard (file photo, not connected to the defendants). Photo: Satheesh Sankaran, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Direct: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Bitcoin_on_Laptop_Keyboard.jpg
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