New York woman gets 13 years in jail for funding ISIS with bitcoin

Hacks • March 16, 2020, 6:36AM EDT
UPDATED: March 16, 2020, 10:46AM EDT
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A New York woman has been sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment for funding the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) with bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

The U.S. Department of Justice announced the news on Friday, saying that the woman, Zoobia Shahnaz, defrauded several banks to obtain money for ISIS during March-July 2017.

Shahnaz fraudulently obtained “more than a dozen” credit cards and used them to purchase approximately $62,000 in bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies online. She then made multiple wire transfers worth over $150,000 to individuals and firms in Pakistan, China and Turkey that were fronts for ISIS, per the Justice Department.

Shahnaz was indicted in December 2017. At the time, the Justice Department said she sought to use American Express Bank, Chase Bank, Discover Bank and TD Bank to transmit funds overseas.

Shahnaz pleaded guilty in November 2018 as she admitted to defrauding banks and laundering stolen funds out of the U.S. for providing material support to ISIS.

AUTHOR

Yogita Khatri profile picture Yogita Khatri

Yogita Khatri is a senior reporter at The Block and the author of The Funding newsletter. As our longest-serving editorial member, Yogita has been instrumental in breaking numerous stories, exclusives and scoops. With over 3,000 articles to her name, Yogita is The Block's most-published and most-read author of all time. Before joining The Block, Yogita wrote for CoinDesk and The Economic Times. You can reach her at [email protected] or follow her latest updates on X at @Yogita_Khatri5.

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