CoinDCX Founders Arrested… But Their Website Got Catfished First

Sumit Gupta and Neeraj Khandelwal, the brains behind India’s crypto behemoth CoinDCX, got hauled in over an alleged $85K scam—despite the fact that they were probably busy trying to remember if they’d ever heard of coindcx.pro. Spoiler: they hadn’t. That domain? A phishing masterpiece run by someone who clearly missed the memo that “crazy returns between August 2025 and February 2026” is the crypto equivalent of promising free Bitcoin if you send a selfie with your cat. The victim? A 42-year-old insurance consultant from Mumbra who, bless his soul, thought he was investing in CoinDCX—but actually just funded a guy named “CryptoKing2025” who probably lives in his mom’s basement and still uses “LFG” as a personal mantra. CoinDCX didn’t just tweet back—they unleashed a full-on crypto SWAT team on X, declaring the FIR a “conspiracy by impersonators” and casually dropping that they’ve reported 1,212 fake sites since April 2024. That’s more fake domains than there are NFT profile pics on Twitter.

The Thane Police, apparently unimpressed by the founders’ IIT pedigree and 20 million users, have extended their custody until March 23—because nothing says “justice” like jailing crypto CEOs for crimes committed by a .pro domain. Meanwhile, CoinDCX, worth a cool $2.45B after Coinbase Ventures threw money at them in October 2025, has had a year that feels like a deranged episode of “Shark Tank” meets “Law & Order: Special Crypto Unit.” Last July, they got hacked for $44M via a fake job offer—yes, really—where the hacker applied for a position, got hired, then stole the keys. The engineer? Arrested. The customers’ funds? Still safe. Like a vampire who only drinks from people who didn’t set up 2FA.

Founded in 2018 by two IIT Bombay alumni who probably coded their first smart contract while still in college, CoinDCX still boasts 20 million users and $165B in annualized volume. Which, if you think about it, is more trading than some small countries do in a fiscal year. So yes, the founders are behind bars. But the real villain? Not greed. Not lax regulation. Not even the SEC. It’s a .pro domain, a typo, and a guy who thought “high yield” meant “I can pay off my credit card with this.” In crypto, the only thing more dangerous than a rug pull? A domain that’s one letter off—and a human who still believes in free money.