Ilya Lichtenstein, who was sentenced to jail final 12 months for cash laundering expenses in connection together with his function within the huge hack of cryptocurrency change Bitfinex in 2016, mentioned he has been launched early.
In a publish shared on X final week, the 38-year-old introduced his launch, crediting U.S. President Donald Trump’s First Step Act. In keeping with the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ inmate locator, Lichtenstein is scheduled for launch on February 9, 2026.
“I stay dedicated to creating a optimistic impression in cybersecurity as quickly as I can,” Lichtenstein added. “To the supporters, thanks for the whole lot. 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 prison justice outcomes and scale back the federal jail inhabitants by way of a sequence of reforms, together with by establishing a “threat and wishes evaluation system” to find out the recidivism threat and chart a approach 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 security 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 have 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 reward playing cards utilizing the stolen bitcoin at an unnamed digital foreign money change. The reward playing cards have been redeemed utilizing Walmart’s iPhone app underneath 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 an announcement shared with CNBC, a Trump administration official mentioned Lichtenstein “served vital time on his sentence and is presently on house confinement per statute and Bureau of Prisons insurance policies.” Morgan additionally acknowledged the information with a message on X, saying, “The most effective New Years current I may get was lastly having my husband house after 4 years of being aside.”
