MANILA, Philippines — The United States on Friday, May 30 (May 29 in Washington DC) announced sanctions against a Philippine-based company owned by a Chinese national which “provides computer infrastructure for hundreds of thousands of websites involved in virtual currency investment scams.” 

In a release, the US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said it was imposing sanctions on Funnull Technology Inc. and its administrator, Chinese national Liu Lizhi.

According to the OFAC, Funnul “enables virtual currency investment scams by purchasing IP addresses in bulk from major cloud services companies worldwide and selling them to cybercriminals to host scam platforms and other malicious web content.” 

The company, said OFAC, is “linked to the majority of virtual currency investment scam websites reported to the FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation].” All in all, those sites are purposed to have resulted in “$200 million in losses, with average losses of over $150,000 per individual.” 

Liu, said OFAC, was “involved in and possessed spreadsheets and other documents containing information about Funnull’s employees, their performance, and their progress on tasks.” 

The sanctions mean that any “property and interests in property” of Funnul or Liu in that are in the United States or owned by a US person “are blocked and must be reported to OFAC.” Properties that Funnul or Lui own at least 50% of are also blocked. 

Those who violate this sanction may face civil or criminal penalties. “In addition, financial institutions and other persons may risk exposure to sanctions for engaging in certain transactions or activities involving designated or otherwise blocked persons,” said OFAC. – Rappler.com

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