TechFlow news, according to Tether's official blog, OKX has announced cooperation with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on an investigation that led Tether to proactively and voluntarily freeze approximately $225 million worth of USDT tokens held in external self-custody wallets. These wallets are linked to an international human trafficking network based in Southeast Asia responsible for global "pig-butchering" romance scams. The joint investigation utilized tools provided by blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis.
Over several months of investigative work conducted by Tether and OKX, U.S. law enforcement agencies, including the DOJ, actively tracked the flow of illicit funds across the blockchain to identify the locations of illegal proceeds. These efforts prompted the U.S. Secret Service to issue a freeze request, leading Tether to take proactive action. The frozen wallets are located in the secondary market and are unrelated to Tether’s customers. If legitimate wallets were inadvertently caught in this operation, Tether will promptly cooperate with law enforcement and wallet owners to unfreeze them as appropriate.
