The US OFAC has announced sanctions on Russian national and cryptocurrency money launderer Ekaterina Zhdanova.

On November 3rd, BlockBeats reported that the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Russian national Ekaterina Zhdanova for her role in laundering money and transferring funds using virtual currencies on behalf of Russian elites. Brian E. Nelson, Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, stated that "through key facilitators like Zhdanova, Russian elites, ransomware groups, and other illicit actors attempt to evade U.S. and international sanctions, particularly through the abuse of virtual currency. OFAC will continue to focus on protecting the U.S. and international financial system and preventing those who seek to exploit this technology and other illicit financial risks in the virtual asset ecosystem." As a result of this action, all property and interests in property of the designated individual located in the U.S. or in the possession or control of U.S. persons must be blocked and reported to OFAC. Additionally, any entity owned, individually or in the aggregate, 50 percent or more by one or more blocked persons is also blocked, unless authorized by OFAC or exempted.