Two arrested over Tk20 crore transactions through cryptocurrency

Members of Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) have arrested two people from Keraniganj area of Dhaka on charge of trading cryptocurrency bitcoin, which is illegal in Bangladesh.

The arrestees are MS Khan Sohan, 26, and Hridoy Sarkar, 23.

A team of RAB-10 conducted an operation at East Charail Nurjahan Nagar area under Keraniganj Model Police Station at around 3:50 pm on Sunday, arresting the duo for trading various types of illegal goods through payment gateway e-wallet.com.bd and various virtual currencies, according to RAB sources.

Rab-10 Commanding Officer Mahfuzur Rahman confirmed the news to The Business Standard.

The elite force also seized one laptop and three mobile phones.

Preliminary interrogation revealed that Sohan was the founder and original admin of e-wallet.com.bd. He has 10 or 12 accounts on various crypto-currency platforms and through these accounts he has made more than 42,712 successful transactions, worth around Tk18 crore to Tk20 crore. The gang used to transact illegal cryptocurrency worth $2000 through these channels, said the Rab official. 

They used to sell illegal cryptocurrencies to customers through this site and collect their illegal money from the customers using bKash, nagad, or rocket agent numbers from different areas including Dhaka.

A case under the Digital Security Act has been filed against the arrestees with the Keraniganj police station.