Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin

A summary of what happened?

Ruja Ignatova, often referred to as the “Cryptoqueen,” is a Bulgarian-born entrepreneur and the founder of OneCoin, a cryptocurrency launched in 2014. Promoted as a revolutionary digital currency, OneCoin was later exposed as one of the largest Ponzi schemes in history, defrauding investors worldwide of approximately $4.5 billion.

Major Concerns, Complaints, and Accusations Against Ruja Ignatova and OneCoin:

1. Fraudulent Cryptocurrency Scheme:
   • Misrepresentation of OneCoin’s Value: OneCoin claimed its value was determined by market supply and demand, with its price allegedly increasing from €0.50 to approximately €29.95 per coin by January 2019. In reality, the value was internally determined and not based on any legitimate market factors. Additionally, contrary to claims, OneCoins were not mined using computer resources.
     Justice Department
2. Pyramid Scheme Operations:
   • Multi-Level Marketing Structure: OneCoin operated as a multi-level marketing network, incentivizing members with commissions for recruiting new investors, a hallmark of pyramid schemes.
     Justice Department
3. Money Laundering Activities:
   • Laundering of Fraud Proceeds: Investigations revealed that proceeds from OneCoin were laundered through various channels. For instance, U.S.-based lawyer Mark Scott was convicted for laundering approximately $400 million of OneCoin’s funds.
     Cointelegraph
4. Ties to Organized Crime and Terrorist Financing:
   • Alleged Connections to Criminal Networks: Reports suggest that Ignatova had ties to the Bulgarian underworld, particularly with mafia figure Hristoforos Nikos Amanatidis, also known as “Taki.” It’s alleged that Amanatidis provided her with protection and may have used OneCoin’s network to launder proceeds from drug trafficking.
     The Times
   • Terrorist Financing Allegations: A Kuwaiti intelligence report indicated that OneCoin might have been a front for terrorist financing, raising significant concerns about the misuse of investor funds.
     Jlevy
5. Disappearance and Evasion of Authorities:
   • Vanishing Act: In October 2017, as authorities closed in, Ignatova disappeared after boarding a flight from Sofia, Bulgaria, to Athens, Greece. Her whereabouts remain unknown, leading to her placement on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, with a $5 million reward for information leading to her arrest.
     New York Post
6. Legal Actions and Asset Freezes:
   • Global Asset Freezes: In August 2024, a London court issued worldwide freezing orders on assets belonging to Ignatova and her associates, aiming to prevent the dissipation of funds obtained through fraudulent activities.
     ICIJ
   • Convictions of Associates: Co-founder Karl Sebastian Greenwood pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
     Justice Department

     Additionally, other associates, including Ignatova’s brother Konstantin Ignatov, faced legal repercussions.

The OneCoin scandal serves as a stark reminder of the potential dangers in the cryptocurrency space, emphasizing the importance of due diligence and skepticism toward investment opportunities promising extraordinary returns.

Analyzing the Fake Copyright Notice(s)

Our team collects and analyses fraudulent copyright takedown requests, legal complaints, and other efforts to remove critical information from the internet. Through our investigative reporting, we examine the prevalence and operation of an organized censorship industry, predominantly funded by criminal entities, oligarchs, and disreputable businesses or individuals. Our findings allow internet users to gain insight into these censorship schemes’ sources, methods, and underlying objectives.

What was Ruja Ignatova - Onecoin trying to hide?

Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin‘s attempts to hide unfavourable content through the misuse of copyright notices while allegedly engaging in perjury present serious legal concerns. These actions suggest a calculated attempt to manipulate legal systems to suppress free speech, a fundamental violation of copyright law principles and an abuse of legal processes. The use of such tactics not only undermines the integrity of copyright protection but also potentially constitutes perjury, further entangling Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin in legal accountability. Let’s examine the information Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin may be trying to remove from the internet –

Investigative Report: Ruja Ignatova and the OneCoin Scandal – A Comprehensive Examination of Allegations and Fraud

Introduction

Ruja Ignatova, known as the “Cryptoqueen,” is at the center of one of the most notorious financial scams in modern history. OneCoin, a cryptocurrency she founded in 2014, promised investors an unparalleled opportunity in the burgeoning world of blockchain technology. However, it was revealed to be a massive Ponzi scheme, defrauding billions from unsuspecting investors across the globe. This investigative report delves into the extensive allegations, lawsuits, and adverse developments surrounding Ignatova and the OneCoin enterprise.

Background: The Rise of OneCoin

Launched in 2014, OneCoin marketed itself as the next big cryptocurrency, claiming superiority over Bitcoin. It appealed to investors with promises of revolutionary technology and astronomical returns. Ignatova, with her charismatic personality and polished public speaking skills, positioned herself as a visionary leader in the crypto space. She hosted glitzy events and touted OneCoin as the “Bitcoin killer,” furthering the illusion of legitimacy.

Core Claims by OneCoin:

• Mining Infrastructure: OneCoin claimed to mine cryptocurrency using blockchain technology. In reality, no such blockchain existed, and the coins were merely entries in a central database controlled by the company.
• Market Valuation: The company manipulated the value of OneCoins, claiming they rose steadily in value. Unlike genuine cryptocurrencies, OneCoin’s price was not determined by market supply and demand but was arbitrarily set by the company.

Major Allegations and Complaints

1. Operating a Fraudulent Ponzi Scheme

• Nature of the Scheme:
  • OneCoin was structured as a multi-level marketing (MLM) operation, incentivizing members to recruit others with promises of commissions.
  • Investors purchased “educational packages” that allegedly contained trading strategies and tokens for OneCoin mining. These packages ranged from a few hundred dollars to over $100,000.
• The Truth Revealed:
  • No legitimate mining took place, and OneCoin did not operate on a blockchain—a fundamental technology for cryptocurrencies.
  • The educational materials were widely criticized as generic and valueless, designed only to lure investors.
• Scale of the Fraud:
  • Over $4 billion was extracted from investors globally, making it one of the largest financial frauds in history.

2. Misrepresentation and Deceptive Practices

• Ignatova and her team falsely presented OneCoin as a legitimate cryptocurrency traded on global markets.
• The company claimed to have partnerships and regulatory approvals that were non-existent.
• Investors were led to believe they could withdraw or trade OneCoins on a proprietary exchange, but withdrawal requests were rarely honored.

3. Money Laundering and Ties to Organized Crime

• Allegations of Money Laundering:
  • Proceeds from the scheme were funneled through shell companies, offshore accounts, and luxury asset purchases.
  • U.S.-based lawyer Mark Scott was convicted of laundering approximately $400 million of OneCoin’s funds.
• Organized Crime Links:
  • Reports suggest that Ignatova had connections with Bulgarian organized crime networks, including protection from Hristoforos Amanatidis (“Taki”), a known mafia figure.
• Terrorist Financing Allegations:
  • A Kuwaiti intelligence report alleged that OneCoin funds might have been used to finance terrorist activities, further elevating global concerns.

4. Disappearance and Evasion of Authorities

• In October 2017, Ignatova vanished after boarding a flight from Sofia, Bulgaria, to Athens, Greece, just as international investigations intensified.
• Her disappearance has made her one of the most wanted fugitives, with the FBI offering a $5 million reward for information leading to her arrest.
• Speculation about her whereabouts includes theories of plastic surgery, hiding under false identities, or even being assassinated by former associates.

5. Legal Actions and Convictions

• Lawsuits and Asset Freezes:
  • A London court issued global asset freezes on Ignatova’s properties, including luxury real estate and bank accounts.
  • Authorities in multiple countries, including the United States, Germany, and China, have launched investigations and issued indictments against Ignatova and her associates.
• Convictions of Associates:
  • Co-founder Karl Sebastian Greenwood was sentenced to 20 years in prison for wire fraud and money laundering.
  • Ignatova’s brother, Konstantin Ignatov, pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges and cooperated with authorities.

6. Impact on Victims

• Millions of victims across Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America lost their life savings in the scam.
• Stories of financial ruin have emerged from families who were lured by promises of wealth and stability.
• Several suicides have been linked to the fallout from the scam.

Public and Media Response

The OneCoin scandal has attracted significant media attention, spawning documentaries, podcasts, and investigative reports:

• The BBC’s The Missing Cryptoqueen podcast has extensively covered Ignatova’s rise and fall, highlighting her charisma and deceit.
• Articles from major outlets, including The New York Times and The Guardian, have underscored the scale of the fraud and the challenges of apprehending Ignatova.

Ongoing Developments

Efforts to Capture Ignatova

• Interpol and Europol have issued red notices for Ignatova.
• Investigations continue into her financial networks and potential collaborators.

Efforts to Reclaim Funds

• Authorities are working to recover assets linked to the scam, though most of the money remains untraceable.
• Victims have organized legal actions, but the recovery process has been slow and uncertain.

Conclusion

The story of Ruja Ignatova and OneCoin is a cautionary tale of how greed, charisma, and deception can exploit human vulnerabilities. While law enforcement continues its search for the elusive “Cryptoqueen,” the victims of her scheme remain without justice. This case underscores the importance of vigilance in the rapidly evolving world of cryptocurrency, where the potential for abuse is as vast as the opportunities for innovation.

How do we counteract this malpractice?

Once we ascertain the involvement of Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin (or actors working on behalf of Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin), we will inform Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin of our findings via Electronic Mail.

Our preliminary assessment suggests that Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin may have engaged a third-party reputation management agency or expert, which, either independently or under direct authorization from Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin, initiated efforts to remove adverse online content, including potentially fraudulent DMCA takedown requests. We will extend an opportunity to Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin to provide details regarding their communications with the agency or expert, as well as the identification of the individual(s) responsible for executing these false DMCA notices.

Failure to respond in a timely manner will necessitate a reassessment of our initial assumptions. In such an event, we will be compelled to take appropriate legal action to rectify the unlawful conduct and take the following steps –

Since Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin made such efforts to hide something online, it seems fit to ensure that this article and sensitive information targeted online by these events get a lot more exposure and traffic than what it would have received originally

We hope this becomes an excellent case study for the Streisand effect…The key idea behind the Streisand effect is that efforts to restrict information can backfire, often causing the information to gain more attention than it would have otherwise. This effect is widespread in the digital age, where users quickly notice and spread censorship efforts on social media and other platforms. Trying to suppress something can unintentionally lead to it becoming more visible, which Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin is finding out the hard way.

Potential Consequences for Ruja Ignatova - Onecoin

Under Florida Statute 831.01, the crime of Forgery is committed when a person falsifies, alters, counterfeits, or forges a document that carries “legal efficacy” with the intent to injure or defraud another person or entity.

Forging a document is considered a white-collar crime. It involves altering, changing, or modifying a document to deceive another person. It can also include passing along copies of documents that are known to be false. In many states in the US, falsifying a document is a crime punishable as a felony.

Additionally, under most laws, “fraud on the court” is where “a party has sentiently set in motion some unconscionable scheme calculated to interfere with the judicial system’s ability impartially to adjudicate a matter by improperly influencing the trier of fact or unfairly hampering the presentation of the opposing party’s claim or defense.”  Cox v. Burke, 706 So. 2d 43, 46 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998) (quoting Aoude v. Mobil Oil Corp., 892 F.2d 1115, 1118 (1st Cir. 1989)).

Is Ruja Ignatova - Onecoin Committing a Cyber Crime?

Yes, it seems so. Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin used multiple approaches to remove unwanted material from review sites and Google’s search results. Thanks to protections allowing freedom of speech in the United States, there are very few legal ways to do this. Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin could not eliminate negative reviews or search results that linked to them without a valid claim of defamation, copyright infringement, or some other clear breach of the law.

Faced with these limitations, some companies like Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin have gone to extreme lengths to fraudulently claim copyright ownership over a negative review in the hopes of taking it down.

Fake DMCA notices have targeted articles highlighting the criminal activity of prominent people to hide their illegal behavior. These people, which include US, Russian, and Khazakstani politicians as well as members from elite circles including the mafia and those with massive financial power, are all connected – and alleged corruption ranging from child abuse to sexual harassment is exposed when exploring evidence found at these URLs. It appears there’s a disturbing level of influence being exerted here that needs further investigation before justice can be served. Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin is certainly keeping interesting company here….

The DMCA takedown process requires that copyright owners submit a takedown notice to an ISP identifying the allegedly infringing content and declaring, under penalty of perjury, that they have a good faith belief that the content is infringing. The ISP must then promptly remove or disable access to the content. The alleged infringer can then submit a counter-notice, and if the copyright owner does not take legal action within 10 to 14 days, the ISP can restore the content.

Since these platforms are predominantly based in the U.S., the complaints are typically made under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which requires online service providers and platforms to react immediately to reports or violations. Big Tech companies rarely have systems in place to assess the merit of each report. Instead, all bad actors need to do is clone a story, backdate it, and then demand the real thing be taken down.

Reputation Agency's Modus Operandi

The fake DMCA notices we found always use the “back-dated article” technique. With this technique, the wrongful notice sender (or copier) creates a copy of a “true original” article and back-dates it, creating a “fake original” article (a copy of the true original) that, at first glance, appears to have been published before the true original.

Then, based on the claim that this backdated article is the “original,” the scammers send a DMCA to the relevant online service providers (e.g. Google), alleging that the ‘true’ original is the copied or “infringing” article and that the copied article is the “original,” requesting the takedown of the ‘true’ original article. After sending the DMCA request, the person who sent the wrong notice takes down the fake original URL, likely to make sure that the article doesn’t stay online in any way. If the takedown notice is successful, the disappearance from the internet of information is most likely to be legitimate speech.

As an integral part of this scheme, the ‘reputation management’ company hired by Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin creates a website that purports to be a ‘news’ site. This site is designed to look legitimate at a glance, but any degree of scrutiny reveals it as the charade it is.

The company copies the ‘negative’ content and posts it “on the fake ‘news’ site, attributing it to a separate author,” then gives it “a false publication date on the ‘news’ website that predated the original publication.

The reputation company then sent Google a Digital Millennium Copyright Act notice claiming the original website infringed copyright. After a cursory examination of the fake news site, Google frequently accepts the notice and delists the content.

In committing numerous offences, Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin either premeditated actions or were unaware of the consequences. Despite hiring an agency to make Google disregard any negative information about Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin, ignorance does not excuse this wrongdoing.

Fake DMCA notices have targeted articles highlighting the criminal activity of prominent people to hide their illegal behavior. These people, which include US, Russian, and Khazakstani politicians as well as members from elite circles including the mafia and those with massive financial power, are all connected – and alleged corruption ranging from child abuse to sexual harassment is exposed when exploring evidence found at these URLs. It appears there’s a disturbing level of influence being exerted here that needs further investigation before justice can be served. FSMSmart is certainly keeping interesting company here.

The Reputation Laundering

Rogue Reputation agencies use spurious copyright claims and fake legal notices to remove and obscure articles linking clients to allegations of tax avoidance, corruption, and drug trafficking. Most of these reputation agencies are based offshore, mainly in Russia, India, and Eastern Europe, and they do not worry about complying with US-based laws.

The content in all of the articles for which the fraudulent DMCA notices have been sent relates to allegations of criminal allegations, including corruption, child abuse, sexual harassment, human trafficking and financial fraud against businesses and individuals with ultra-high net worth.

In addition to the misuse of the DMCA takedown process, there is a notable absence of enforcement concerning perjury violations. The statutory requirement related to perjury is designed to deter copyright holders from submitting fraudulent or knowingly false takedown requests, as they may face legal consequences for making false declarations under penalty of perjury. However, to date, there have been no known instances of any individual being prosecuted for perjury in connection with the submission of false DMCA takedown notices.

This lack of enforcement has emboldened copyright holders to exploit the DMCA takedown process to suppress dissent, criticism, or other unfavorable content, without fear of legal repercussions.

Some of the people and businesses who have employed this tactic to remove legitimate content from Google illegally include a Spanish businessman-turned-cocaine-trafficker, Organised crime, an Israeli-Argentine banker accused of laundering money for Hugo Chávez’s regime, a French “responsible” mining company accused of tax evasion, child molesters and sexual predators. Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin is in great company ….

What else is Ruja Ignatova - Onecoin hiding?

We encourage you to ‘Dork‘ Google by searching for keyword combinations such as [Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin] + {Negative Keyword, such as Scam, Fraud, Complaints, Lawsuit, Sanction, etc} on Google. It’s likely if you scroll down to the bottom of this Google search results, you’ll stumble upon this Legal Takedown notice (pictured below)

To make such an investigation possible, we encourage more online service providers to come forward and share copies of content removal requests with industry experts and researchers. If you have any information on Ruja Ignatova – Onecoin that you want to share with experts and journalists, kindly email the author directly at [email protected].

All communications are strictly confidential and safeguarded under a comprehensive Whistleblower Policy, ensuring full protection and anonymity for individuals who provide information.