Ilya Lichtenstein, who was sentenced to jail final yr for cash laundering prices in connection together with his function within the huge hack of cryptocurrency alternate Bitfinex in 2016, mentioned he has been launched early.
In a put up shared on X final week, the 38-year-old introduced his launch, crediting U.S. President Donald Trump’s First Step Act. Based on the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ inmate locator, Lichtenstein is scheduled for launch on February 9, 2026.
“I stay dedicated to creating a optimistic influence in cybersecurity as quickly as I can,” Lichtenstein added. “To the supporters, thanks for every part. To the haters, I stay up for proving you fallacious.”
The First Step Act, handed by the Trump administration in 2018, is a bipartisan laws that goals to enhance felony justice outcomes and scale back the federal jail inhabitants by way of a collection of reforms, together with by establishing a “danger and desires evaluation system” to find out the recidivism danger and chart a method ahead for an early launch in some circumstances.
Lichtenstein and his spouse, Heather Rhiannon “Razzlekhan” Morgan, pleaded responsible to the Bitfinex hack in 2023, following their arrest in February 2022. The 2016 safety breach enabled Lichtenstein to fraudulently authorize greater than 2,000 transactions, transferring 119,754 bitcoin (then value roughly $71 million) from Bitfinex to a cryptocurrency pockets in his management.
Regulation enforcement authorities additionally recovered roughly 94,000 bitcoin (valued at round $3.6 billion in 2022), making it one of many largest seizures within the historical past of the U.S. In January 2025, U.S. prosecutors filed a movement for the recovered property to be returned to Bitfinex.
Blockchain intelligence agency TRM Labs mentioned Lichtenstein exploited a vulnerability in Bitfinex’s multi-signature withdrawal setup to provoke and authorize withdrawals from Bitfinex with out requiring approvals from BitGo, a third-party digital asset belief firm.
Whereas the illicit proceeds had been subsequently transformed to different cryptocurrencies and funneled by way of mixing companies like Bitcoin Fog, the couple’s function got here to mild following the acquisition of Walmart present playing cards utilizing the stolen bitcoin at an unnamed digital forex alternate. The present playing cards had been redeemed utilizing Walmart’s iPhone app below an account in Morgan’s identify.
Lichtenstein was sentenced to 5 years in jail in November 2024. Morgan, who was sentenced to 18 months of incarceration shortly after, posted on X in late October 2025, stating she was launched “like a month in the past” and that “jail was chill sufficient.”
In a press release shared with CNBC, a Trump administration official mentioned Lichtenstein “served important time on his sentence and is presently on house confinement in keeping with statute and Bureau of Prisons insurance policies.” Morgan additionally acknowledged the information with a message on X, saying, “One of the best New Years current I may get was lastly having my husband house after 4 years of being aside.”
