The US Secret Service froze $52.8 million in cryptocurrency linked to Xinbi Guarantee on 8 September, a Chinese-language marketplace operating on Telegram that sells the tools scammers need to defraud people around the world.
Government agents worked with blockchain analytics firm Elliptic to identify and freeze the funds. "Elliptic has been tracking Xinbi and its wallet infrastructure for several years, and our intelligence directly enabled today's freezing action, as well as the sanctions imposed on Xinbi today by the United States," the company said in a statement.
Fifty-two wallets were frozen starting at 8am UTC on 8 September, all holding USDT, Tether's dollar-pegged stablecoin. Two of those wallets, containing roughly $12 million, were seized directly under a warrant unveiled today by the Department of Justice. The rest remain frozen pending further action.
A guarantee marketplace runs on trust between criminals, and cryptocurrency is a popular payment method for it. Xinbi is not a marketplace in the ordinary sense, but rather a custodial system where sellers post crypto deposits so that operators can trust they will receive what they paid for, ranging from stolen personal data to money-laundering services that turn stolen funds back into cash.
Buyers who feel cheated can be reimbursed from that deposit, which is why criminals use it instead of simply trusting one another.
Since 2022, Xinbi and its traders have processed at least $24 billion in transactions, according to Elliptic, making it the second-largest illicit online marketplace ever tracked. Only Huione Guarantee moved more, processing $31 billion before Telegram shut it down in May 2025, after years of exposure by Elliptic.
That came days after a separate Treasury finding that the group controlling Huione was a primary money-laundering concern. Xinbi absorbed much of that traffic as soon as its predecessor disappeared.
Much of the money flowing through platforms like this starts with the "pig butchering" scam, in which a stranger builds a fake romance or friendship online over weeks or months, then convinces the victim to pour their savings into a fake investment app that shows fabricated profits until the account is drained.
The Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control — the unit that blocks assets linked to national security threats and crime — designated Xinbi as a transnational criminal organisation on 9 September, the same category used for drug cartels. Two other companies, Singapore-based SafeW Technology and Cambodia-based Anwen Technology, were sanctioned alongside it for supporting Xinbi's operations. The United Kingdom had already sanctioned Xinbi in March.
Xinbi did not take the freeze quietly. The marketplace published a statement condemning the "arbitrary freezing" of its funds and promised to compensate its customers.
Xinbi appears to be shifting from USDT to USDD, a stablecoin launched by Tron founder Justin Sun that has no central issuer able to freeze wallets. It has already swapped roughly $2.8 million of its remaining USDT for USDD through a decentralised exchange.
There is just one problem. USDD presents itself as decentralised, but part of its own reserves is backed by USDT — the same asset with the freezing mechanism Xinbi is trying to escape.
Wednesday's action was part of a larger day for the DOJ's Scam Center Task Force, which also sent agents to Madagascar to help local authorities dismantle 13 Chinese-run scam compounds and process evidence from nearly 400 detainees, including more than 3,200 seized devices.
The Task Force, launched in November 2025, has seized roughly $938 million in scam-linked cryptocurrency since it began operating — and Xinbi's outstanding balance is still on the board.
* Translated and edited with permission from Decrypt.
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