The American authorities ordered Jeremy Spence (a.k.a. “Coin Signals”) to pay over $2.8 million in restitution to victims of his cryptocurrency fraud. The US Department of Justice (DOJ) sentenced the criminal to 42 months in prison in May for running a scheme that defrauded investors with more than $5 million. ‘An Illustration of the CFTC’s...Read More
CroLend, presenting itself as an algorithmic, autonomous lending protocol built on top of the Cronos network, has deleted all social media pages, the website doesn’t work, and its TVL has been drained to $0. This prompted the community to argue that this is the latest example of a rug pull in the space. Citing user...Read More
Two robbers reportedly deceived an Asian investor and his friend with a fake bitcoin scheme and stole nearly $50,000, three phones, and documents from them. The Criminal Court sent the wrongdoers to jail for three years and ordered their deportation once going out of prison. Crime in Dubai According to a recent coverage, the assault...Read More
The Estonian police arrested two individuals in the country’s capital Tallinn for their alleged involvement in a $575 million cryptocurrency scam. According to the prosecution, Sergei Potapenko and Ivan Turõgin lured hundreds of thousands of victims to interact with a dubious digital asset mining service and to invest in a virtual currency bank. The entities...Read More
A new report from blockchain security firm CertiK revealed that a large group of professional “Know Your Customer (KYC)” actors are being employed by dubious blockchain developers and scammers to defraud crypto investors. KYC verification systems are used by crypto projects in the Web3 space to establish customer identity and qualify the source of funds....Read More
The Albanian authorities will reportedly extradite the notorious Faruk Fatih Ozer (CEO of the distressed crypto exchange Thodex) to Türkiye. He escaped his homeland last year after allegedly defrauding the platform customers for nearly $2 billion. Justice to Be Served According to a recent coverage by BBC, the Albanian and Turkish authorities negotiated the deportation...Read More
A new study has found nearly all crypto projects listed on Uniswap between 2018 and 2021 were malicious and scam-related. The study titled DO NOT RUG ON ME: ZERO-DIMENSIONAL SCAM DETECTION, was conducted by three researchers; Bruno Mazorra, Victor Adan, and Vanesa Daza from the University of Pompeu Fabra and the University of Barcelona. Could...Read More
The popular Instagram influencer Jebara Igbara, also known as “Jay Manzini,” pleaded guilty to money laundering, wire fraud, and wire fraud conspiracy. He used the social media platform to promote various schemes to investors but, in fact, defrauded them with $8 million. In addition, Igbara told his followers he wanted to buy a huge amount...Read More
The popular cryptocurrency options exchange, Deribit, has seen its hot wallet exploited for a considerable $28 million earlier today. According to a statement from a company’s spokesperson shared with CryptoPotato, the funds are safe, and the loss has already been compensated by their reserves. Deribit took it to Twitter earlier today to reveal that its...Read More
Right as the weekend was about to start, crypto Twitter sounded the alarm on a possible rugpull scam on Aptos. A relatively new blockchain environment touted as a “Solana-killer,” Aptos is a Layer-1, PoS blockchain built by two former devs from the Diem Group, Mo Shaikh and Avery Chang. The pair reportedly worked on developing...Read More
The United Kingdom High Court shut down the cryptocurrency firm PGI Global for allegedly running a fraudulent scheme. The company promised investors returns of up to 200% if they purchased digital assets through its platform, but consumers never received such profits. The Latest Crypto Scam in the UK? According to an official press release, the...Read More
Numerous scam tokens have launched under the symbol “TWIT” following Elon Musk’s latest Twitter bio change related to his acquisition of the company. With just a day to go before the billionaire acquires Twitter, Elon Musk has changed his bio on the platform to read “Chief Twit.” In the aftermath, multiple tokens named either “TWIT”...Read More
The residents of Massachusetts – Erig Meiggs and Declan Harrington – will go to jail for two years for stealing approximately $330,000 worth of cryptocurrency from victims. The criminals employed multiple techniques to drain assets, including “SIM swapping” and computer hacking. Fraudulent schemes involving digital assets have been on the rise lately in the USA....Read More
The Turkish authorities reportedly detected an illicit betting organization that used cryptocurrencies to launder crime funds. Following the investigation, law enforcement agents arrested 46 individuals involved in the scheme and confiscated $40 million worth of digital assets. ‘This Is Just the Beginning’ According to a local coverage, the Turkish police have detained the suspects across...Read More
Scams related to crypto wallets are on the rise, and users report a phishing application for mobile devices masquerading as Nami Cardano wallet designed to steal seed phrases and funds. The fake wallet was found on Apple’s App Store and is still available for download. If a user enters the seed phrase, the app steals...Read More
Scammers have reportedly sent consumers a new Solana Phantom security update assuring it will grant additional protection. However, wrongdoers have installed password-stealing malware through airdropped NFTs and used them to drain cryptocurrency from the affected wallets. Another Scam in the Space A recent coverage revealed that the scheme started two weeks ago when NFTs called...Read More
Brazil’s Federal Police reportedly halted the operations of a criminal gang led by the businessman Francisco Valdevino da Silva, a.k.a “Bitcoin Sheikh.” The authorities claimed that the wrongdoers defrauded thousands of people in the past few years and laundered up to 4 billion Brazilian reals ($766 million). Another Crypto Ponzi Scheme in Brazil GloboNews revealed...Read More
The Delaware Department of Justice’s Investor Protection Unit halted the operations of 23 entities and individuals involved in cryptocurrency romance frauds, known as “pig butchering” scams. A recent analysis conducted by Bankless Times estimated that Americans lost around $185 million between January 2021 and March 2022 due to such schemes. Crypto Scammers Again in the...Read More
Law enforcement agents from Hengyang (a city in the southern Chinese province Hunan) have reportedly busted a criminal group that employed cryptocurrencies to launder 40 billion yuan (approximately $5.6 billion). Over the past several months, China’s authorities halted numerous similar schemes, arresting thousands of people. The ‘Hundred-day Action’ According to a local coverage, the Chinese...Read More
Hackers have reportedly attacked several big-name South Korean YouTube channels in the past few months. After gaining access, most wrongdoers used the platform to upload cryptocurrency-related videos. Among the victims was the official YouTube channel of the South Korean government. Earlier this month, a group of cybercriminals compromised it so they could promote a crypto...Read More
Aiden Pleterski – a 23-year-old Canadian trader and self-described “Crypto King” – is being sued after allegedly failing to return at least $35 million to his investors. Authorities have already seized $2 million in assets from the Ontarian, including two McLarens, two BMWs, and a Lamborghini. Crypto Trader, or Fraudster? Pleterski ran a business called...Read More
The Securities and Exchange Commission launched a lawsuit again two advisory companies and their owner for running a Ponzi-like cryptocurrency scheme. The firms operated for over four years and manage to raise nearly $4.4 million. The lawsuit is against Creative Advancement LLC and Edelman Blockchain Advisors LLC as well as their owner – Gabriel Edelman....Read More
The Department of Justice (DOJ) of the United States created a unit consisting of over 150 federal prosecutors whose goal will be to combat cryptocurrency-related criminal activities. In addition, the government plans to introduce a set of regulatory frameworks that should aid the development of the local digital asset sector. Earlier this year, the DOJ...Read More
The cybercrime team of the Central Netherlands police arrested a 39-year-old resident of Veenendaal on suspicion of laundering tens of millions of euros via stolen cryptocurrencies. The police also suggested that the individual amassed his digital asset holdings through fake updates from crypto wallet Electrum. The Latest Crypto Scam in the Netherlands The Netherlands’ police...Read More
Joshua David Nicholas – a resident of Florida – pleaded guilty that he and other members of the cryptocurrency platform EmpiresX skimmed investors with $100 million worth of digital assets. He now faces a maximum penalty of up to five years in Federal prison. Last month, the US authorities brought to justice another criminal crew...Read More
Cryptocurrency scams are, unfortunately, a never-ending part of the industry, in which bad actors are trying to offer something too good to be true (usually to double one’s assets). The latest example came hours ago when Apple had a live event in regards to the new iPhones, AirPods, and Apple Watches. When the nearly 50-year-old...Read More
Popular cryptocurrency influencer and a well-known member of the community – FatManTerra – took it to Twitter to reveal that he deliberately created a fake Ponzi scheme to raise funds. The initiative supposedly saw upwards of $100,000 worth of BTC in investments. The influencer said: In two hours, I received over one hundred DMs. I raised 3.45%...Read More
The Albanian authorities arrested Faruk Fatih Ozer – the CEO of the Turkish cryptocurrency exchange Thodex – in the city of Elbasan. Last year, the platform ceased trading and withdrawals, while the 28-year-old executive was rumored to have left Turkey with $2 billion in users’ funds. Despite not managing to detect Ozer’s whereabouts, Turkish law...Read More
The US Department of Justice (DOJ) charged three residents of Miami – Esteban Cabrera Da Corte, Luis Hernandez Gonzalez, and Asdrubal Ramirez Meza – with defrauding banks and a cryptocurrency platform for over $4 million. The men used fake identification to buy digital assets, while later, they lied to financial institutions that the transactions were...Read More
SudoRare – a decentralized non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace – is reportedly the latest crypto project that had rug-pulled its customers. The project, established earlier today, shut down its operations six hours after launch after it was rug-pulled for 519 ETH (around $850,000 going by current prices). The blockchain security company – PeckShield – indicated that...Read More
