Another Day, Another Crypto Wrench Attack in France

Armed assailants stormed a family home in Verneuil-sur-Seine on Friday evening, launching a brutal attack on a crypto investment executive and his family in what has become the latest "wrench attack" to rock France's crypto community.

The family managed to break free and sought refuge with neighbors while the attackers fled toward a nearby train station, according to the report.

One day before the Verneuil-sur-Seine attack, kidnappers abducted a 43-year-old man from his residence in Saint-Léger-sous-Cholet during the early morning hours of Friday.

Investigators from the Specialized Interregional Jurisdiction of Rennes confirmed the attackers were after the victim’s crypto, after his family had already faced multiple attempted break-ins over the Christmas holidays.

"France has recently experienced one of the most visible waves of violent, crypto-linked kidnappings and extortion attempts in the EU," cybercrime consultant David Sehyeon Baek told Decrypt.

The spike in violent crypto crime has exposed serious vulnerabilities in how criminals identify potential targets.

Baek warned that this has raised concerns about how criminals are identifying targets, including the potential misuse of tax or other confidential data.

"Given France's relatively high crime rates, it is not particularly difficult to argue that the country could see more crimes like this," he said. "What we are really seeing is just the tip of the iceberg. Crypto crime is indeed heavily underreported, and that is not accidental."

He explained that victims frequently avoid filing reports because "reporting a crypto crime often means exposing far more than just the crime itself, as it can mean revealing wallet sizes, transaction histories, trading behavior, and possible tax or compliance issues that people would rather keep private."

“Victims weigh the low chance of recovering funds against the high perceived risk of tax trouble, wealth exposure, reputational damage, or even physical danger,” he added. “For many, staying quiet feels safer than speaking up.”