Ruja Ignatova

Ruja Plamenova Ignatova (born May 30, 1980 – disappeared October 25, 2017), also known by the nickname "Cryptoqueen", is a Bulgarian-German entrepreneur and con artist. She is one of the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives, and is best known as the founder of the fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme OneCoin, which The Times described as "one of the biggest scams in history." She was the subject of the 2019 BBC podcast series The Missing Cryptoqueen and the 2022 book of the same name. There have been no confirmed sightings of Ignatova since she boarded a Ryanair flight from Sofia to Athens on October 25, 2017. Since her disappearance, Ignatova has long been presumed to be on the run from various international law enforcement agencies. The FBI has offered up to five million dollars for any information leading to her arrest. On March 7, 2019, an indictment was unsealed in which the United States charges Ignatova with wire fraud, securities fraud and money laundering. The FBI added Ignatova to the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list in June 2022. Ignatova is the subject of an Interpol warrant issued by German authorities. Reporting in 2023 and 2024 suggested that Ignatova may have been murdered in 2018 on the orders of Bulgarian organised crime figure "Taki" Hristoforos Nikos Amanatidis, who is suspected of initially sheltering her.