Crypto Tycoon's Daughter Narrowly Escapes Kidnappers in Paris
The trio were walking near Square de la Roquette in the French capital early Tuesday morning when a van bearing a Chronopost logo — something like the French UPS — pulled up next to them.
Three masked individuals then jumped out, and a brief struggle ensued as they attempted to drag the mother and son into the back of the van. The woman's husband intervened and was hit with "blunt objects," according to The Telegraph.
During the struggle, the woman appears to disarm one of the attackers and throw a handgun aside (it would later turn out to be an airsoft gun.) The would-be kidnappers fled in the vehicle, before abandoning it on a nearby street.
The victims were treated for minor injuries, according to the Telegraph.
https://twitter.com/coinpapercom/status/1922525731340329184
It's a horrifying attack, but unfortunately par for the course for the cryptocurrency industry. Criminals have been some of crypto's biggest adopters throughout its short history, drawn to the decentralized currency as a way to move huge sums of money quietly, without ever alerting a centralized bank or financial authorities.
Had the kidnappers succeeded, the ensuing ransom could have been virtually untraceable.
A longtime crypto magnate, Pierre Noizat is the co-founder of Paymium, one of the world's first cryptocurrency exchanges. Though his exact fortune isn't known, at the time of writing, his business processed over $132 million in Bitcoin in the last week alone — making him and his family an attractive target, to say the least.
While rich executives have long been targeted by criminals — there's literally a cottage industry called Kidnap, Ransom, and Extortion Insurance — crypto bigwigs and their associates are becoming prized trophies in violent crime circles.
In November of last year, Dean Skurka, CEO of crypto platform WonderFi, was nabbed off the streets of Toronto and held for a $1 million ransom. That same month, three teenagers kidnapped one of the executives behind Tokenize 2025, a Las Vegas-based crypto event, driving him out to the desert where they demanded his crypto passwords at gunpoint. Though the group has since been identified, they made out with an estimated $4 million worth of crypto and NFTs.
Similar incidents involving high-net-worth crypto traders have been reported in Pakistan, Spain, Australia, and Bali. Back in France, this is the fourth high-profile kidnapping case involving crypto whales recorded in recent months.
One particularly stunning incident involved David Balland, the co-founder of Ledger, along with his wife, who were abducted from their home back in January. The couple was freed following a massive raid by French national police, but not before Balland had his finger cut off and mailed to his co-founder as part of his kidnappers' $11.2 million ransom attempt.
On Wednesday, the French interior minister announced a meeting with high-value cryptocurrency magnates to "work with them on their security, and so that they can become aware of the risks."
Whether it will stymie the huge upswing in crypto kidnappings is anyone's guess. Financial analysts have found that more millionaires than ever are placing their fortunes on the blockchain — meaning crypto-conscious criminals are spoiled for choice.
More on Crypto: OnlyFans Star Amouranth Says She Was Robbed at Gunpoint for Her Crypto
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