EOCO busts offshore crypto fraud, recovers over US$15m – Attorney General

The Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) has uncovered and dismantled a complex offshore cryptocurrency fraud scheme that targeted both Ghanaians and foreign nationals, leading to the recovery of more than US$15 million in digital assets.

Attorney General and Minister for Justice, Dr Dominic Ayine, disclosed this at the government’s Accountability Series on Thursday, December 18.

According to him, investigations revealed that cryptocurrency wallets linked to the fraudulent operation were hosted on the Seychelles-based exchange platform, OKX.

Dr Ayine explained that internal investigations by OKX corroborated EOCO’s findings, confirming that the transactions under review were fraudulent. He said over 1,000 transactions were traced to a single computer IP address and a specific location, indicating the involvement of one individual rather than multiple independent actors.

Further probes, including Know Your Customer (KYC) information obtained by EOCO, identified the wallet holder as a Chinese national residing and working in Ghana under a valid resident permit.

The suspect was also found to be an employee of the company allegedly used to defraud several Ghanaian and British victims.

Dr Ayine said EOCO acted swiftly to shut down the company implicated in the scam and seize its operations to prevent further losses.

“In the course of the investigation, the company used to defraud Ghanaians was shut down and its operations seized. On November 19, 2025, ZODIAC successfully converted the cryptocurrency assets of the criminal enterprise and transferred US$15,191,730 into the EOCO exhibit account,” he stated.

The Attorney General described the operation as a major breakthrough in Ghana’s fight against organised financial crime, particularly in the rapidly evolving digital and cryptocurrency space.