From Minecraft to US$245 million crypto heist: S’porean forfeits 28 cars to US after guilty plea

Published Sep 09, 2026, 05:30 PM

Updated Sep 09, 2026, 05:30 PM

SINGAPORE - Singaporean Malone Lam was 19 years old in October 2023 when he flew to Texas on his own to live with a few gamers he befriended online through the video game Minecraft .

Within a month of living together, the group hatched a plan to steal cryptocurrency by impersonating employees of security and technical support teams at major companies like Google, and cryptocurrency exchanges like Coinbase.

Lam, who told US investigators that he had dropped out of school when he was 13 years old, used his knowledge of computer software and technology to obtain breached databases containing cryptocurrency-related information and lists of high-net-worth individuals.

The group then targeted these individuals.

After analysing the stolen data, Lam triggered “account access attempt” push notifications to the targets, to make them think there were unauthorised attempts to access their accounts.

Other members of the group would then convince the targets to provide personal account information by pretending to be security technicians, gaining access to their digital currency wallets or passwords to their accounts before stealing their cryptocurrency.

On Sept 9, Lam pleaded guilty at the US District Court for the District of Columbia for his role as a ringleader in organising one of the US’ largest cryptocurrency thefts.

Around June 2024, Lam and his associates targeted a victim by accessing his iCloud storage account through social engineering methods and concluded that the victim held a significant amount of cryptocurrency in a digital wallet.

When Lam was unable to break into the wallet online, the group sent one of their associates to break into the victim’s house in New Mexico, but they were ultimately unable to access the digital wallet even after successfully breaking into his home.

Their largest haul came in August 2024. In the days leading up to the digital heist, Lam continually sent Google account access attempt notifications to the victim, who was identified only as R.W.

On Aug 18, 2024, Lam’s associates called R.W. and claimed to be a Google representative following up on unauthorised account access attempts. Lam was eventually able to access R.W’s Google account and locate his cryptocurrency holdings after taking over his Google OneDrive account.

The group then impersonated the security team at Gemini, a virtual currency exchange and custodial bank, and convinced R.W. to provide the private keys to a portion of his digital currency holdings.

They then siphoned off some US$245 million from R.W.

Now 22, Lam faces a maximum jail sentence of 20 years. A sentencing date has not been fixed.

Forfeiture orders seen by The Straits Times show that at least 28 luxury vehicles have been seized from Lam.

The fleet of cars, which cost between US$100,000 and US$3.8 million each , includes vehicles from Rolls-Royce, at least seven Lamborghinis, multiple Ferraris and the sports car Pagani.

At least 95 pieces of jewellery, luxury watches, clothes and shoes were also seized and forfeited from Lam. Court documents show some watches cost upwards of US$500,000 each.

Lam admitted that he had come to an arrangement with his criminal group to divide up the proceeds of their fraud scheme and to launder the stolen money into clean “fiat” currency so they could spend the money freely.

Besides using common cryptocurrency laundering techniques including exchange platforms that do not require know-your-customer information, Lam and his associates also engaged the assistance of professional money launderers they had found operating on the dark web.

Because of the sums of money they were dealing with and moving , Lam and his associates came to an agreement to only engage in transactions of more than US$10,000 with the professional money launderers.

One such network was described in court documents as a Russian money laundering operation that existed on a dark web forum.

Lam also engaged the services of a San Jose-based money launderer to help convert his share of the stolen cryptocurrency into cash, using the same launderer to help him obtain private jet flights, rentals of mansions in Miami, and nightclub bottle services where Lam was recorded spending up to US $500,000 in a single night.

He was eventually arrested by FBI agents in September 2024 and has been held on remand since.

发布于2026年9月9日下午5:30

更新于2026年9月9日下午5:30

新加坡——2023 年 10 月，19 岁的新加坡人 Malone Lam 独自飞往德克萨斯州，与他在电子游戏《我的世界》中结识的几位游戏玩家一起生活。

同居不到一个月，这伙人就制定了一个计划，通过冒充谷歌等大型公司和 Coinbase 等加密货币交易所的安全和技术支持团队员工来窃取加密货币。

林某告诉美国调查人员，他13岁就辍学了，利用自己对计算机软件和技术的了解，获取了包含加密货币相关信息和高净值人士名单的被入侵数据库。

该组织随后将目标锁定在这些人身上。

在分析了被盗数据后，林向目标用户触发了“账户访问尝试”推送通知，让他们以为有人未经授权试图访问他们的账户。

该团伙的其他成员会假扮安全技术人员，诱骗目标对象提供个人账户信息，从而获取其数字货币钱包或账户密码，然后窃取其加密货币。

9 月 9 日，林某在美国哥伦比亚特区地方法院认罪，承认其作为主谋组织了美国历史上最大的加密货币盗窃案之一。

2024 年 6 月左右，林和他的同伙通过社交工程手段访问了一名受害者的 iCloud 存储帐户，并得出结论，该受害者在数字钱包中持有大量加密货币。

当林某无法在线破解钱包时，该团伙派了一名同伙闯入受害者在新墨西哥州的家中，但即使成功闯入，他们最终也未能访问该电子钱包。

他们最大的一笔赃款是在2024年8月获得的。在这次数字盗窃案发生前的几天里，林某不断向受害者（化名RW）发送谷歌账户访问尝试通知。

2024年8月18日，Lam的同伙致电RW，自称是谷歌代表，正在调查未经授权的账户访问尝试。Lam最终成功访问了RW的谷歌账户，并在接管其谷歌OneDrive账户后找到了RW的加密货币资产。

该团伙随后冒充虚拟货币交易所和托管银行 Gemini 的安全团队，并说服 RW 提供其部分数字货币持有量的私钥。

随后，他们从RW公司挪用了约2.45亿美元。

现年22岁的林某面临最高20年的监禁。宣判日期尚未确定。

《海峡时报》看到的没收令显示，至少有 28 辆豪车从林某处被查获。

这支车队每辆车的造价在 10 万美元到 380 万美元之间，其中包括劳斯莱斯汽车、至少七辆兰博基尼、多辆法拉利和帕加尼跑车。

至少有95件珠宝、名表、衣物和鞋履被从林某处查获并没收。法庭文件显示，部分名表单价超过50万美元。

林承认他与犯罪团伙达成协议，瓜分诈骗所得，并将赃款洗白成干净的“法定”货币，以便他们可以自由支配这些钱。

除了使用常见的加密货币洗钱技术（包括不需要了解客户信息的交易平台）外，林和他的同伙还寻求在暗网上活动的职业洗钱者的帮助。

由于他们经手和转移的资金数额巨大，林和他的同伙达成协议，只与专业的洗钱者进行超过 1 万美元的交易。

法庭文件将其中一个网络描述为存在于暗网论坛上的俄罗斯洗钱行动。

林还雇佣了一名圣何塞的洗钱者，帮助他将自己分得的被盗加密货币兑换成现金。他还利用这名洗钱者为他安排私人飞机航班、在迈阿密租豪宅以及在夜总会享受酒水服务，据记录，林一晚在夜总会消费高达 50 万美元。

他最终于 2024 年 9 月被 FBI 特工逮捕，并一直被羁押至今。