Greetings! It’s September 26, and we’re tracking today’s top stories: MoneyGram services restored after mystery cyber incident, Russia has a secret war drones project in China, China’s shadowy crypto brokers lure $75B, Europeans recruited for sabotage ops via Telegram, and much more…

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Featured Story

🎯 MoneyGram services restored but questions remain about cyber incident. MoneyGram had widespread outages that limited millions from sending money around the world. Record

Top Stories

🌎 Russia has secret war drones project in China. The invoices requesting yuan payment don’t specify delivery dates or identify the suppliers in China. Reuters

🇷🇺 Treasury Hits Illicit Russian Virtual Currency Exchanges and Cybercrime Facilitator U.S. Treasury

🌎 China’s Shadowy Crypto Brokers Lure $75B as Economy Toils.  Russian commodities firms and Chinese clients have used digital assets to settle cross-border transactions. Bloomberg 

🔐 Featured Report: German Law Enforcement Seizes Servers of 47 Russia-centric No KYC Exchanges Chainalysis

🌎 ‘Make a Molotov Cocktail’: How Europeans Are Recruited Through Telegram to Commit Sabotage, Arson, and Murder OCCRP

🌎 Congress to Weigh Call for ‘Immediate Release’ of Jailed Binance Executive.  Tigran Gambaryan has been held in custody by Nigeria since February. Decrypt

🔐 Binance Helped India Trace $48M Related from Gaming Scam CoinDesk

🌎 NYC Mayor Adams Indicted After Corruption Probe. The widening investigations of City Hall first became public when FBI agents raided home of campaign fundraiser. Bloomberg

🌎 China-Linked Hackers Breach U.S. Internet Providers in ‘Salt Typhoon’ Cyberattack. It is latest intrusion into core U.S. infrastructure by entities tied to Beijing. WSJ 

🌎 Our flag means cash: The Latvian trader abetting Russia’s billion-dollar oil sanctions evasion. Petrodollars continue to flow into Russia’s budget thanks to its shadow fleet. The Insider

🚩 From Russia to the Houthis With Love WSJ

🌎 CIBC paying $42M for U.S. records-keeping violations. CIBC failed to stop employees, including top leaders, from breaking bank's own policies. Bloomberg

🚩 FinCEN Withdraws Finding and NPRM Regarding ABLV Bank FinCEN

🌎 How a Princeton rower became Diamondhands and fooled Silicon Valley’s most famous VC firm – twice. Al-Naji would ultimately charm the likes of Sequoia and Google into pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into his startups. Fortune

🌎 The Secretive Supply Chain Sending EU Trucks to Syria. Investigation finds evidence of a secretive supply chain routing vehicles from Europe to Syria through Jordan and Lebanon. OCCRP

🚩 U.S. issues sanctions over shipment of Iranian oil to Syria, East Asia Reuters

Russia

🇷🇺 The oily way: Сracking down on Russia's crude sanction workarounds The Insider

🇷🇺 Britain targets Russian LNG sector with fresh shipping sanctions Reuters

🇷🇺 Europe's Skyrocketing Trade With Russian Neighbor Raises Questions Newsweek

🇷🇺 Russia’s adaptability to U.S. sanctions stymied their effectiveness AP

🇷🇺 Iran brokering talks to send advanced Russian missiles to Yemen's Houthis Reuters

China

🇨🇳 Chinese banks facilitating transfers to firms supplying sanctioned equipment to Russian oil companies The Insider

🇨🇳 Legislation to curb US investment in China is top priority Reuters

🇨🇳 Hone Capital, a Silicon Valley firm, is being probed by the FBI TechCrunch

🇨🇳 Impending expiry of U.S. sanctions license threatens Russia's yuan liquidity Reuters

Corruption & Financial Crime

💸 Attorneys for Trump to argue for reversal of $454M fraud judgment ABC 

💸 U.S. sanctions former politician once close to President Moïse, along with gang leader Miami Herald

💸 Outrage as U.S. DOJ defends UN staffers who collaborated in Hamas’ terror NYP

💸 Anna Wolfe won a Pulitzer for a Favre scandal story, now she could face jail ESPN

💸 Skael Co-Founder Faces U.S. Fraud Charges WSJ

Crypto & Cyber

🔐 Millions of Vehicles Could Be Hacked and Tracked Thanks to a Simple Website Bug. Wired

🔐 Crypto Hackers Nabbed $409M in Q3 Record

🔐 Utah Judge Rules SEC’s Case Against Crypto Mining Scam Green United Can Proceed CoinDesk

🔐 PayPal Enables U.S. Business Accounts to Buy, Hold and Sell Crypto CoinDesk

Trafficking

🚚 Drug gang using Chinese money brokers uncovered Reuters 

🚚 It Was Supposed to Be a Sting Operation. Did ICE Traffic Drugs Instead? Rolling Stone

🚚 New class of opioids that may be more potent than fentanyl emerges globally Guardian

“Change. But start slowly, because direction is more important than speed.” —Carl Jung

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