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Money laundering can be a complicated thing. Crypto opens up all kinds of fun techniques to would-be cleaners. Here we have a case that shows a simple truth: using all the fancy techniques in the world doesn’t matter if you don’t understand what they do, and when to use them. Another lesson from this case is that trying to obfuscate your activity on a public ledger is pointless. An elaborate shell game is pointless when all the moves are publicly recorded.

Alleged drug trafficker John McKernan is the subject of today’s satirical OpSec review. A witness says that John is a self-described autist who “rides his bike here to the store.” According to video evidence he dressed for the part. The story begins (if you’re going to accept the FBI as the sole perspective character for this particular tale) when a darknet vendor called KingofKeys caught the attention of our friends at the FBI.

This one gets a bit murky in places because a significant portion of the case file is currently redacted and makes referrence to a parallel and ongoing investigation. If I had to venture a guess I would say that this second investigation is likely in regards to a fellow who goes by the moniker Baphomet, as he was co-founder of BreachForums and has vowed to pick up the torch in a signed message to the community.

A bitcoin mixer is something you’re probably already familiar with if you’re reading this blog. The idea is that you put your dirty bitcoin in, it gets all jumbled up in a cloud of transactions, and then it comes out squeaky clean. In theory the receiving wallet shouldn’t be easily traced back to the origin wallet. Our topic today involves an alleged operator of one such bitcoin mixer, called ChipMixer. As a law-abiding citizen, and someone who doesn’t have much need to hide how I’m spending my money, I don’t really have a need for services like that.

This is a fun case that reads like a great episode of Law & Order: SVU. A corrupt badge, craigslist rape hoaxes, a woman who is (probably) innocent getting sent to jail because the state is incompetent. It also has my favorite thing of all: OpSec fails so glaringly obvious that even an amateur like yours truly can point them out. Let’s get started… Convicted Of Conspiracy, Cyberstalking, Perjury, and Obstruction

Joanne was the last person anyone had suspected of being a drug trafficker! The grandmother (and part-time Paula Deen lookalike) worked as executive director of the San Jose Police Officers’ Association by day, and allegedly as a key player in a global fentanyl ring also by day. I challenge you to find a legacy media article about this case that doesn’t pop a Breaking Bad reference. Actually, don’t waste your time since those won’t teach you anything useful.