Google Security Engineer Arrested for $1.2M Polymarket Insider Trading Scheme

According to ChainCatcher, citing materials from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, Michele Spagnuolo, a Google security engineer, has been arrested and charged for allegedly using material non-public information to trade on Polymarket's Google-related prediction markets. Spagnuolo transferred approximately 3.8 million USDC to Polymarket addresses and profited over 1.2 million dollars through the scheme. His associated account, AlphaRaccoon, placed bets on prediction markets within hours of accessing Google's internal tools that track trending search figures.

According to the indictment, Spagnuolo used Google's internal systems to access the 2025 most-searched people list before public release. He then allegedly withdrew 5 million USDC from his Polymarket account and moved funds through exchanges and privacy tools to obscure their trail. Spagnuolo faces charges of commodity fraud, wire fraud, and money laundering.