https://www.vice.com/en/article/the-fbi-ran-an-elon-musk-crypto-money-laundering-operation-for-almost-a-year/

After being hijacked by the FBI, a cybercrime ring was operated by federal agents for close to a year, and it’s exactly as sketchy as it sounds.

As first reported by 404 Media, the FBI’s year-long operation of the dark web money laundering operation “ElonmuskWHM” advertised on shady forums like White House Market allowed criminals to “cash out” their cryptocurrency—profits from drug deals, ransomware attacks, and other nefarious deeds—without ever revealing their identities.

Cybercriminals could send their digital loot and receive cash in the mail, with ElonmuskWHM (then the FBI) receiving a hefty 20 percent cut in exchange.

The FBI didn’t just infiltrate ElonmuskWHM the way they might in fictional depictions of the organization in movies and TV. They didn’t plant a mole or two within its ranks to acquire valuable information that could be used in a court case one day. They ran the operation for 11 months, allowing $90 million worth of cryptocurrency to flow through their system.

The FBI’s undercover tactics aren’t exactly subtle and may not have been constitutional. 404 Media’s Joseph Cox reported that the organization went so far as to demand Google hand over information about anyone who watched a specific YouTube video during an eight-day window—an action many would argue crosses the line into Big Brother territory.

But all this snooping wasn’t for nothing: it led to the arrest of an Indian national named Anurag Pramod Murarka, ElonmuskWHM’s mastermind.

The FBI didn’t stop when Murarka was arrested and sentenced to 10 years in prison. They used his mules, usually immigrants to New York who ran legitimate businesses, to uncover even more links to global criminal enterprises.

The agency’s approach to cybercrime is clear: give criminals the tools they need and watch them dig their own graves. Whether any of it is constitutional is up for debate.