The Justice Department's Scam Center Strike Force, working alongside the Treasury Department, seized a Chinese-language scam marketplace called Xinbi Guarantee and restrained approximately $52 million in cryptocurrency, U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro announced this week. The operation brings the Strike Force's total restraints since its founding to roughly $938 million.
Xinbi operated almost entirely on Telegram in Chinese, functioning as a marketplace where vendors advertised services to scam center operators, including building custom fraud investment websites, laundering stolen funds, and recruiting trafficking victims to staff scam compounds. The platform held vendor payments in escrow until jobs were completed, allowing prosecutors to trace victim funds to specific wallets.
A federal court in Washington authorized the seizure of Xinbi's Telegram channels on September 7. Investigators seized two crypto wallets worth approximately $12 million and sought restraint of 47 additional wallets tied to the network. The Treasury's Office of Foreign Asset Control designated Xinbi a transnational criminal organization on the same day, along with two other entities accused of supporting it.
In a separate operation during the same period, Strike Force teams assisted authorities in Madagascar in dismantling 13 Chinese-run scam compounds, expanding the crackdown launched in November 2025 beyond its original footprint in Southeast Asia.
Xinbi had previously been sanctioned by the British government in March. Chainalysis estimated the platform had processed nearly $20 billion in cryptocurrency between 2021 and 2025. The criminal group resumed operations after that earlier action by opening new Telegram channels.
According to federal data cited in the announcement, reported crypto investment fraud losses totaled $8.65 billion in 2025, up 89 percent from $4.57 billion in 2023. The FBI notes these figures are significantly under-represented because most fraud victims do not report losses.
