Officials with the U.S. Department of Justice said a Chinese national has been extradited and arraigned over allegations he had a role in an international cryptocurrency investment conspiracy that targeted U.S. citizens.
Zhen Zao, 44, allegedly carried out the operation from scam centers in the Kingdom of Cambodia. U.S. officials identified 174 U.S. victims of the scam that induced U.S. victims to transfer funds to accounts controlled by co-conspirators, who then laundered the money through U.S. shell companies, international bank accounts, and digital asset wallets.
“This extradition should be a lesson to all those who seek to exploit vulnerable Americans from overseas,” Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “We will pursue charged defendants anywhere in the world, especially those who are alleged to have stolen money, converted it to cryptocurrency, and used foreign financial institutions in the process to try to hide and obfuscate their crimes. Wherever you are, we have the reach to find you.”
Officials allege the scam would begin with overseas co-conspirators contacting U.S. victims via social media interactions, phone calls, text messages or online dating services, and then, once they had established trust, promoting fraudulent digital asset investments to the scam victims. Then the co-conspirators created fake websites to resemble real cryptocurrencies trading platforms and convinced victims to send funds through those platforms for investments.
The scammers would then tell victims their investments were appreciating in value, when in reality the scammers had stolen the victims’ money. The DOJ estimates more than $36.9 million in victim funds were transferred from U.S. bank accounts controlled by the co-conspirators to an account at Deltec Bank in the Bahamas. Zhao and other co-conspirators then arranged for Deltec Bank to convert victim funds to cryptocurrency Tether and to transfer the converted funds to a digital asset wallet controlled in Cambodia, where the funds were once again transferred to the leaders of scam centers throughout the region.
In August 2025, Zhao was charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering. If convicted, he faces a maximum of 20 years in prison. Eight co-conspirators have pleaded guilty so far, ShengSheng He and Jingliang Su, who each pleaded guilty to conspiracy to operate an unlicensed money transmitting business and were sentenced to 51 months and 46 months in prison, respectively.
“As crime has globalized, so has law enforcement’s ability to locate and catch criminals,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli for the Central District of California said. “When innocent Americans are harmed by cybercriminals and their enablers, we and our partners around the globe will relentlessly ensure they face justice in a U.S. courtroom.”