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A 22-year-old Canadian cryptocurrency hacker who purportedly swindled two DeFi protocols out of $65 million has escaped from custody after being apprehended in Serbia.
Andean Medjedovic, a native of Hamilton who obtained a master’s degree in pure mathematics at the age of 18, now confronts charges across various jurisdictions, with his location remaining a mystery.
This week, a criminal indictment was made public against Andean Medjedovic, a Canadian citizen accused of manipulating two decentralized finance protocols to secure approximately $65 million in illicit funds from the investors of these protocols. https://t.co/peirBeNDJ3 pic.twitter.com/YHkoGmq9vk
— FBI (@FBI) February 5, 2025
Medjedovic’s four-year evasion came to an end with his arrest in Belgrade in August 2024, only for him to escape once more from authorities seeking his extradition.
Mathematical Prodigy Turned Criminal: The $65M Double Heist
Medjedovic’s alleged unlawful activities began in October 2021 when he manipulated the index pools of Indexed Finance using borrowed cryptocurrencies, siphoning off over $16.5 million from investors.
The subsequent year, he conspired with an unnamed partner to launder the stolen assets through fraudulent exchange accounts and cryptocurrency mixers.
His most audacious heist took place in November 2023, when he reportedly exploited the code of KyberSwap to artificially influence prices within the protocol’s liquidity pools.
“Medjedovic then calculated specific combinations of trades that would cause the KyberSwap AMM to ‘glitch,’ in his own words, enabling him to misappropriate tens of millions of dollars in cryptocurrency from the liquidity pools,” states the United States Attorney’s Office.
Medjedovic withdrew funds from KyberSwap. | Source: TRM Labs.
The Vietnam-based platform suffered a loss of $48.8 million in the incident.
Shortly following the heist, the assailant issued a public statement: “Negotiations will commence in a few hours when I am fully rested. Thank you.”
KyberSwap proposed a standard 10 percent bug bounty, which Medjedovic outright refused. Instead, he demanded complete control of the Kyber platform and offered to return only 50 percent to investors.
The KyberSwap team has been in touch with the owners of the frontrun bots that extracted approximately $5.7M* worth of funds from KyberSwap pools on Polygon and Avalanche during the exploit.
We have negotiated with the owners of the frontrun bots to return 90% of the users’ funds taken…— Kyber Network (@KyberNetwork) November 26, 2023
As reported by CBC, Dutch authorities traced the hack to a hotel in The Hague, where Medjedovic allegedly checked in using a forged Slovak passport.
Two weeks after his flight departed Amsterdam for Kuwait via Istanbul in late November 2023, Dutch authorities issued a European arrest warrant, followed by an Interpol Red Notice.
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Court documents indicate that Medjedovic spent those intervening years traveling widely.
He visited Brazil, Dubai, Spain, Bosnia, and Serbia while striving to uphold his extravagant lifestyle with stolen cryptocurrency.
Arrested in Belgrade, Then Disappeared — Where Is He Now?
Medjedovic’s flight from justice concluded on August 9, 2024, when he arrived in Belgrade using the alias “Lorenzo” to rent an apartment. Interpol Belgrade promptly alerted Dutch authorities upon his capture.
During extradition proceedings at the Belgrade Higher Court, Medjedovic refuted all allegations. “I do not wish to go to the Netherlands,” he asserted, adding that “I would like to have children in Serbia and to accomplish more things here.”
He claimed he had spent four months in Dubai and had visited the Netherlands for three months “on a tourist trip.” Despite being Canadian, Medjedovic informed the court that he holds only a Bosnian passport.
Fake Passport. | Source: Balkan Insight
The U.S. indictment disclosed that Medjedovic kept meticulous records of his schemes, including one labeled “moneyMovementSystem” with detailed guidelines for laundering cryptocurrency through mixers.
He allegedly wrote notes to “create a new bank account under a fake ID” and “order documents online (Russian + Brazilian + American citizen).”
His Next Move: Return the Funds or Face Prison Time
As of this publication, Medjedovic has vanished from Serbian custody, and the stolen $65 million lies dormant in crypto wallets.
“He needs to be flawless from this point onward in concealing the proceeds of this exploit, which are being monitored,” remarked Kyle Armstrong, a former FBI agent at blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs.
Ari Redbord, TRM’s global head of policy, highlighted that modern digital tracking makes extended evasion increasingly challenging.
“Everything is connected to the overall expansion of the crypto ecosystem,” states Ari Redbord (@ARedbord) of @trmlabs, speaking to @RemyBlaireNews as he addresses rising illicit crypto volumes and why they constitute a minor portion of total activity. pic.twitter.com/09Z0UcRElK
— FINTECH.TV (@FintechTvGlobal) January 16, 2026
“The reality is that at some point you must come in and acknowledge your actions and possibly do everything you can to ultimately assist the government,” he stated.
If Medjedovic declines to cooperate by returning the funds and accepting accountability, he could face over 10 years in prison.
The post Canadian Hacker Steals $65M, Disappears From Custody — What Happened? appeared first on Cryptonews.
