The CEO of a South Korean cryptocurrency company, Haru Invest, was recently attacked in the middle of a trial in Seoul. Hugo Hyungsoo Lee was stabbed multiple times in the neck by a man who is believed to be a victim of Haru Invest’s alleged fraudulent activities. Local media outlets reported that Lee was immediately taken to the hospital following the attack.
The assault took place during the trial where Lee, along with two other executives from Haru Invest, were accused of stealing a staggering $826 million in cryptocurrency from about 16,000 users. Reports suggest that the attacker, a man in his 40s, sprang from the guest seat armed with a small knife and targeted Lee.
This event follows an unexpected halt of withdrawals by Haru Invest on June 13, 2023. Another company, Delio, which had some funds held with Haru Invest, also stopped withdrawals a day later. The abrupt suspension of withdrawals is one of the issues under scrutiny in the ongoing fraud trial.
South Korean authorities apprehended three high-ranking executives from Haru Invest, including CEO Lee, in February 2024. The executives received charges of stealing digital assets worth around $826 million from the firm’s customers. Allegedly, the executives claimed to operate a ‘risk-free diversified investment’, which later turned out to be an alleged misappropriation of customer-deposited coins, run from March 2020 to June 2023.
Physical attacks related to digital assets are becoming increasingly common, which is a shift from the more familiar cyberattacks and hacks. For instance, a recent event in Thailand saw a group of four Chinese nationals forcefully extracting $2 million worth of cryptocurrency from an individual at gunpoint. In another case in Ukraine, four men kidnapped a known Bitcoin holder, forcing him to transfer his 3 Bitcoins into their wallets, subsequently murdering him. There was also a separate event in London, where three armed men invaded a home, ordering the homeowner to transfer 1000 Ether, equivalent to around $2.5 million.