Investigators have linked a figure in the $30 million ZKasino alleged scam to a fresh cryptocurrency project branded WhiteRock (WHITE), on-chain analyst ZachXBT reported in a June 16 post on X.
WhiteRock surfaced in December 2024 with an anonymous team, overstated user counts, and unverifiable claims about a USDX reserve, researchers at Blokiments wrote in a memo dated June 13.
Evidence
ZachXBT added fresh evidence by finding an influencer that received payment from a WhiteRock-tied wallet, which also aggregates deposits traceable to ZKasino’s treasury.
Separate transfers in February and March show identical amounts exiting a ZKasino wallet to an instant exchange and entering WhiteRock addresses moments later through Monero bridges.
A potential personal link tightens the overlap. An address that deployed WhiteRock’s contracts exchanged messages with [email protected], an email tied to a Chess.com account using the handle “IldarTheGrandMaster.”
Ildar Ilham, also known as “Prometheus” in the ZKasino episode, has used the alias “Goedel” across multiple developer channels.
ZachXBT stated that the match “confirms at least one ZKasino founder directs WhiteRock activity.” He urged centralized venues MEXC and Gate.io to delist WHITE or perform deeper vetting.
He argued that prior conduct in ZKasino and other projects tied to their team, such as Syncus and Zigzag, shows a pattern of raising capital, cycling funds through privacy rails, and abandoning stated roadmaps.
Court dates for Ilham and two other ZKasino co-founders, Elham Nourzai and Lior Ben Zakan, have not yet appeared on Dutch public dockets. WhiteRock’s website lists no corporate entity, and project administrators did not answer email queries sent by ZachXBT on Sunday.
ZKasino loss and laundering paths
ZKasino raised more than $30 million worth of Ethereum (ETH) during a 2024 presale, then diverted user assets instead of building the advertised gambling platform.
The Dutch financial crime agency FIOD arrested the co-founder, known online as “Derivatives Monke,” in April 2024 and seized related infrastructure.
Two associates, Ilham and Lior Ben Zakan, operated from the Middle East at that time, according to court filings cited by ZachXBT.
Transactions tracked after Nourzai’s late 2024 release show the stolen ETH moving through zkSync, Starknet, Solana, and multiple EVM-compatible chains.
Wallet owners routed funds to over-the-counter brokers, swapped tokens for Monero via instant exchanges, and punted perpetual futures on Hyperliquid. Those steps broke asset provenance while funneling capital toward new ventures.
Mentioned in this article
Credit: Source link
