NORTH LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Federal agents arrested a South Florida man on Tuesday, accusing him of participating in a video game malware conspiracy in which dozens of unsuspecting victims lost six figures worth of cryptocurrency after downloading infected games.
In a 15-page federal criminal complaint, FBI agents said Zyaire Dontaevious Zamarion Wilkins, 21, of North Lauderdale, financed and procured the malware and then helped market the infected games, which were distributed on a “popular digital distribution software company.”
That company is not directly named in the complaint, but information contained within strongly suggests that it was the platform Steam, one of the largest of its kind.
Games identified in the complaint ― including BlockBlasters, Dashverse, Lunara and PirateFi ― were named in a plea for victim information in a “Steam malware investigation” by agents in FBI’s Seattle office. The case against Wilkins and others involved is being prosecuted in Seattle federal court and Steam’s parent company, Valve Corporation, is based in nearby Bellevue, Washington.
Agents said in the scheme, Wilkins and others “gained unauthorized access to approximately 80 cryptocurrency wallets and stole cryptocurrencies worth at least $220,000″ from May 2024 to this February by “launch(ing) eight games embedded with malware and infect(ing) the devices of approximately 8,000 individual customers.”
According to the complaint, Wilkins and others helped market the games on social media and messaging applications, including Discord, Telegram, X and LinkedIn and encouraged others to download them.
Additionally, agents said the conspirators targeted specific victims, using bots “to identify individuals with large cryptocurrency holdings and send them targeted messages” encouraging them to download the games.
“After their victims downloaded the games, the conspirators used the malware to access and steal private user data and credentials,” the complaint states. “(They) went through the stolen data and identify any information that could be used to access, without authorization, cryptocurrency accounts of others and steal cryptocurrencies from their victims.”
Wilkins, believed to be a student at the University of West Florida, used the handle “Sibel.eth” online, according to the complaint, which he used to communicate with the “primary developer” of the programs.
That person is not identified in the complaint.
Agents said after executing a search warrant on the primary developer’s home and seizing devices, they found chats with “Sibel.eth” on the encrypted messaging platform Signal showing a “high level of collaboration” between the two.
They said that the chats showed that Wilkins bought a “remote access trojan” program for $10,000.
The primary developer and Wilkins also “exchanged messages about a criminal scheme in which they would run ‘draining campaigns’ regarding cryptocurrency wallets” and the two discussed “tricking victims into authorizing transactions that instantly empty their wallets,” according to the complaint.
Authorities said they were to identify “Sibel.eth” as Wilkins by tracing cryptocurrency payments sent from the scheme’s Bitcoin wallet to Bitrefill, an online service which was used to purchase over 150 digital gift cards that were predominantly for Uber Eats.
An FBI subpoena to Uber revealed that those cards were linked to an account that had deliveries at Wilkins’ UWF addresses as well as at Wilkins’ home in South Florida.
Agents said they executed a search warrant at Wilkins’ North Lauderdale home last Wednesday. He “refused to speak with law enforcement,” they said.
According to the complaint, investigators seized multiple devices as well as “three cryptocurrency wallet seed phrases.”
“One of the seed phrases is for a Monero wallet, an anonymity-enhanced cryptocurrency frequently used by criminals that is difficult to trace between source and destination,” an agent wrote in the complaint. “Based on my training and experience, I know that cybercriminals use Monero to enhance anonymity and the difficulty in cryptocurrency transaction attribution for law enforcement.”
A review of Wilkins’ crypto transaction history showed he sent or received $382,000, according to the complaint.
Following his arrest, Wilkins faces a charge of conspiracy to obtain information by computer for private financial gain, a charge that could land him in prison for up to a decade.
Federal court records didn’t provide a timeline on Wednesday morning as to if or when Wilkins could be extradited to Washington state.
Those records did show that Wilkins was scheduled to appear in Fort Lauderdale federal court on Wednesday morning.
Local 10 News contacted a spokesperson for Valve Corporation on Wednesday morning seeking comment about the case and Steam’s security measures. As of the publication of this article, we were awaiting a response.
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