A wave of violent kidnappings targeting cryptocurrency millionaires is spreading alarm across Europe, with French police recently rescuing a man whose captors severed one of his fingers while demanding a multi-million euro ransom.
The elite GIGN police unit stormed a house near Paris on Saturday night to free the victim, a 60-year-old investor involved in a Malta-based cryptocurrency marketing firm run by his son. The man had been abducted two days earlier in broad daylight on a street in Paris’s affluent 14th arrondissement by four masked men who bundled him into a delivery van.
According to reporting by The Times (UK), the kidnappers demanded between €5 million and €7 million. The man’s ordeal closely mirrors a similarly harrowing incident in January, when David Balland, co-founder of the crypto hardware wallet company Ledger, was kidnapped at gunpoint from his home in central France. Balland was also mutilated, with one of his fingers severed during captivity, while abductors demanded a €10 million ransom.
Authorities fear these cases are part of a growing criminal trend targeting high-net-worth individuals in the digital currency space, whose wealth is often portable, untraceable, and easy to liquidate if stolen.
Balland, whose company is valued at €1.3 billion, was kidnapped along with his partner Amandine. They were separated by the assailants; Balland was later discovered bound and injured in a house in Châteauroux. Police arrested 11 suspects, including a 26-year-old man with a prior record for kidnapping, who is believed to be the gang’s ringleader.
In the most recent case, police acted swiftly. Investigators feared further harm would be inflicted had they not located and stormed the residence in Palaiseau, a suburb about 12 miles south of Paris. Five suspects in their twenties were arrested at the scene, with two more apprehended the following day.
But the cases go beyond France. In December, the father of a prominent French crypto influencer based in Dubai was abducted from his home in eastern France while his wife and daughter were tied up. The perpetrators sprinkled the man with petrol and stuffed him into a car trunk before police rescued him in Normandy. Other incidents have been reported recently in Spain and Belgium, reinforcing concerns of a broader European crime wave targeting crypto-linked figures.
With cryptocurrency continuing to attract both legitimate investment and criminal interest, security experts warn that the new class of digital wealth holders — often young and publicly visible — are especially vulnerable to extortion and violence.
