BlockBeats News, March 27th: According to Caixin, more than two months after the founder of the Prince Group in Cambodia, Chen Zhi, was detained, the UK further sanctioned a Southeast Asian fraud network, including Hu Xiaowei, who is closely associated with Chen Zhi. The UK government referred to Hu Xiaowei as the “long-term partner of Chen Zhi” in the Prince Group, with origins related to the private server of “Legend,” and later jointly established companies both domestically and overseas. On March 26th, the UK government website published this sanction information, which includes multiple individuals and entities related to the Prince Group.
38-year-old Chen Zhi, the founder of the Prince Group, was born in a fishing village in Fujian. He previously ran an Internet cafe and worked as a network administrator. He started his career by “robbing” private servers of “Legend” as a hacker. Over a decade ago, he went to Southeast Asia and became a Cambodian citizen. In just a few years, he controlled a global online fraud network, making millions of dollars a day from his Duke position, with a net worth of tens of billions of dollars. The bitcoins alone confiscated by the United States were worth $15 billion. At the peak of his power, Chen Zhi also had a presence in Singapore, the UK, Taiwan, China, and other locations. In early January 2026, he was stripped of Cambodian citizenship and extradited to China on suspicion of multiple crimes, including fraud, illegal business operations, and concealing criminal proceeds.
