A hacker in Zhejiang Province was sentenced to four years and four months in prison for illegally controlling over 150 servers and concealing illicit proceeds in cryptocurrency.

Zhou, a hacker from Quzhou City, Zhejiang Province, was sentenced by a court to four years and four months’ imprisonment and fined for the crime of illegally controlling computer information systems. Zhou exploited security vulnerabilities in websites to illegally control over 150 government and enterprise servers, causing links on websites belonging to 157 organizations to redirect to overseas pornographic websites. He also profited by reselling control rights. According to disclosures by the investigating authorities, Zhou settled his illicit proceeds using virtual currencies such as USDT and TRX, dispersing and concealing them across multiple cryptocurrency wallets. Authorities subsequently seized assets valued at over RMB 42 million through a cryptocurrency tracing system. Additionally, Zhou voluntarily surrendered over RMB 28 million in illicit gains.