Regulators in the U.S. teamed up with their counterparts in Bulgaria and Israel to arrest 19 people on charges they took part in a complex international fraud and money laundering ring that tricked companies and consumers out of millions of dollars.

U.S. authorities uncovered the organized crime groups in 2011 when they discovered a makeshift call center operating out of a Washington hotel room. The operation was used to post phony car ads online advertising cars, luring customers with prices far below market value. Once the customers placed a deposit for the cars, the fraudsters would cut off contact and disappear with the money, authorities said. "Money mules" would then withdraw the cash and transport it in bulk to a network of money launderers in Europe, authorities said.

A second scheme defrauded unnamed German and Portuguese companies out of millions of dollars in phony transactions in 2014 and 2015. Using fake email addresses to impersonate the CEO or president of a company, the defendants would instruct mid-level employees to wire hundreds of thousands of dollars for a "secret" financial transaction, such as a corporate acquisition. The bank accounts were controlled by the criminals, who disappeared with the money, authorities said.