Airline passenger solved biggest known crypto heist worth $243,000,000 sitting on airport runway

A man is thought to have solved the biggest known Cryptocurrency scam against an individual - all from an airport runway.

Losing out on a bit of cash can be painful, whether that's wasting $15 on a disappointing take-out or forgetting to cancel your gym subscription - again.

I can't begin to imagine the gut-wrenching feeling of losing a cool $243,000,000 worth of Bitcoin, which is what happened to one unlucky crypto whale.

When anonymous vigilante ZachXBT boarded a flight home on August 19, he began receiving alerts on his phone.

An unusually large transaction, worth almost $600,000, had been made via a Bitcoin blockchain he monitors. Then went $1m. Then $2m.

With just 30 minutes to spare before he'd have to switch his phone off for take-off, ZachXBT managed to trace the money, determining it had come from a crypto wallet holding millions of dollars of Bitcoin, untouched since 2012.

ZachXBT continued to trace the heist from 10,000 feet in the air (M_a_y_a/Getty Images)

Suspecting he was witnessing a major theft unfold, ZachXBT then discovered around $243m worth of Bitcoin had been stolen from one victim - possibly the biggest known crypto theft to target one person.

He told WIRED: “It was such an abnormally large amount stolen from a single person. I had to make sure I wasn't crazy.”

From 10,000 feet in the air, finally connected to wifi, ZachXBT continued to follow the digital trail.

He saw the stolen funds quickly dispersed across more than a dozen platforms, a tactic used in a bid to cover up the heist.

This didn't slow ZachXBT down though, as he traced some of the funds back to the now-defunct Genesis cryptocurrency exchange.

He got in touch with Genesis administrators on X, formerly Twitter, requesting to be connected with the victim, who later hired him to track down the missing millions.

ZachXBT's online persona (@ZachXBT/X)

By the time his flight touched down, ZachXBT identified three main channels the stolen funds had flowed through, each linked to likely suspects.

He posted his findings to X, prompting one source to step forward with more information on the alleged thieves.

Over the course of a week, ZachXBT worked tirelessly to identify the alleged suspects, sharing his findings with law enforcement.

He even managed to track down the supposed hackers' Instagram and TikTok accounts, watching as one splashed out on fancy cars and private jets - as well as clubs where they allegedly dropped $500,000 a night.

Less than a month since ZachXBT's phone first pinged pre-flight, Malone Lam, 20, of Miami, Florida and Jeandiel Serrano, 21, of Los Angeles, California, were arrested and charged with conspiracy to steal and launder over $230 million in cryptocurrency from a victim in Washington, D.C.

Lam, a citizen of Singapore, went by the online monikers 'Anne Hathaway' and '$$$', while Serrano used 'VersaceGod' and '@SkidStar'.

According to the indictment, since at least August 2024, Lam, Serrano, and others conspired to carry out cryptocurrency thefts and to launder the stolen crypto currency through exchanges and mixing services.

The conspirators would fraudulently gain access to victim cryptocurrency accounts and then transfer victim funds into their possession.

The investigation continues.