Man Tied to Alleged ZKasino Scam Arrested in the Netherlands

Authorities in the Netherlands have been alerted to the possibility of the ZKasino scam being conducted out of the country. As a result, a person who is related to the online gambling platform, has been arrested.

The Fiscal Information and Investigation Service (FIOD) has confirmed that a 26-year-old man was arrested on April 29, and he now faces charges of money laundering, fraud, and embezzlement. Authorities were also able to seize $12.2 million worth of cryptocurrency, along with real estate and luxury cars, a report shared on May 3 said.

Swift Justice Befalls Alleged ZKasino Scammer

The man is arrested in relation to ZKasino, the gambling platform that promised to change the way gambling worked but ended up migrating the $33 million worth of investor funds onto another protocol without any notice. The funds were migrated to the Lido staking protocol, with a total of 10,515 ETH disappearing in an instant from the project on April 20.

ZKasino left investors disappointed and gutted by the loss of what has been a massive amount of money. Although ZKasino at first denied fraudulent intent, the casino shuttered its Telegram channel and blocked withdrawals so that investors could not recoup any money.

Around the time of the transaction, ZKasino tried to keep investors busy, claiming that it had collected $350 million in fresh capital from the likes of Big Brain Holdings and MEXC, a crypto exchange. Investors denied participating in any funding round involving ZKasino, with Big Brain Holdings taking to X, previously Twitter, to refute those claims.

“Big Brain Holdings invested into the @zigzagexchange project in 20220, which subsequently resulted in financial losses for us. Some of the previous founders of that project are now part of the @ZKasino_io team, which appears to be fraudulent.

We have never invested in ZKasino but we offered a pro-rata token distribution that we have not received and will not opt to receive.”

Pulling the Rug Under the Fraudsters’ Feet

Surprisingly, this rug pull did not go unnoticed, with authorities working actively to track down the guilty parties, as they possibly have. The suspect has been detained for 14 days, while Dutch authorities are conducting a further investigation.

The case is interesting as investors originally thought that the rug pull would not elicit any follow-up from law enforcement. Yet, in this case, the Netherlands has been able to track down the fraudulent activity back to its home turf, with authorities swiftly acting to ensure that the guilty parties are brought to justice.