Felix Holtermann and Christian Schnell of the German Handelsblatt reported on the money-laundering report filed against Wirecard by the European Funds Recovery Initiative (EFRI). In a detailed article titled “The past catches up with Wirecard” the background of the global scam industry and the respective involvement of payment processors is explained.
The EFRI-Initiative was set up at the end of 2018 by FinTelegram together with Elfriede Sixt, an Austrian Certified Public Accountant, and lawyers as a platform for the operation of funds recovery for injured investors. One of the focal points is the action against financial service providers and payment processors who knowingly or grossly negligently accepted and thus supported investment scams for years. In this respect, these money-laundering complaints are a means to an end to go after the money stolen from the unsuspecting ripped-off investors and to hold the financial service providers involved, such as Wirecard, Payvision, or Brüc Bond (formerly Moneta International) responsible.
Wirecard has, for example, facilitated the scams of the now-imprisoned German Uwe Lenhoff. In doing so, payments from broker scams such as Option888 were processed despite public warnings from financial market supervisory authorities as well as numerous customer complaints and lawyers’ request letters. Wirecard has also processed numerous other scams such as 24Options, AlgoTechs/BEALGO, or HandelFX as payment processors and thus contributed and still contribute to the fact that these scams have been able to defraud tens of thousands of customer victims and tens of millions.
In mid-February, we reported suspicions of money laundering to the Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, the Munich Public Prosecutor’s Office and the European Central Bank. These scams have been facilitated by European financial services institutions over the last couple of years. German banks such as Wirecard are serving as scam facilitators by processing payments for fraudulent and/or illegal businesses. Only if they are held accountable can this type of cybercrime be stopped.
EFRI principal Elfriede Sixt.
The Handelsblatt article is another important building block in making the public, authorities, and politicians aware of the dangers of cybercrime. Cybercrime is the worst threat to the digital cybersociety of today and tomorrow. The protection of citizens from cybercriminals must be a top priority. Also in the interest of sound cyberfinance and the further development of the FinTech segment.
