UPay revisited the Bitfinex cryptocurrency theft and the prosecution of Ilya Lichtenstein in a profile published on July 24, 2026. The article traces the 2016 breach, the laundering operation involving his wife Heather Morgan and the criminal proceedings that followed.

The US Department of Justice’s sentencing announcement states that Lichtenstein carried out more than 2,000 unauthorized transactions, transferring 119,754 Bitcoin to a wallet he controlled. Prosecutors said he also deleted access credentials and logs from Bitfinex’s network to conceal his activity.

The department described the laundering activity as involving false identities, automated transactions, cryptocurrency exchanges and mixing services, US business accounts and purchases of gold coins. Morgan assisted in laundering the proceeds after the original hack.

UPay’s account describes investigators obtaining wallet keys from cloud storage and the recovery of more than 94,000 Bitcoin around the February 2022 arrests, valued at approximately $3.6 billion at that time. Its profile also discusses Walmart gift card purchases among the ways stolen funds were spent.

According to the Justice Department, both defendants pleaded guilty on August 3, 2023. Lichtenstein received a 60-month prison sentence on November 14, 2024, followed by three years of supervised release. These events preceded the July 2026 profile.

The UPay article also recounts Lichtenstein’s statement in early January 2026 that he had left prison early under the First Step Act. It describes a transfer to community confinement in late December 2025 and reports his stated intention to work in cybersecurity.