Crypto Investment Fraud

Over my 3 years experience with mentoring crypto students, about half of the people that came in, did so after they were have allready fallen prey to a scam.

The biggest loss I have personally encountered is in the amount of $400.000 and then $200.000, 40k, 10k, 1.5k, the guy I worked with yesterday lost $25.000. Needless to say, the amount people loose to a crypto scam is irrelevant, a loss is a loss and people lose according to what they have available to spend. If there is one thing worth mentioning regarding the amounts lost that would be that the scams work so good that usually the ones that fall victim loose all the money they have available to invest / spend. The most common phrase I hear is "> Oh my god, I've lost all of my savings!"

The number of people that fall prey to crypto scams is very large, in fact, it seems to be one of the most prevalent and damaging fraud schemes today, according to FBI. Well, I can only confirm that, based on my direct experience with a few tenths of people that I have worked with during the last 3 years. Make no mistake: the schemes are very well engineered, they rely on an arsenal of technical tools and, many times, are orchestrated by a whole team of people that move in tandem through various channels. They are nothing short of a professional operation put together by very skilled individuals!

What do they have in common and how can you prevent being scammed?
In the FBI article that I will reference at the end of this post, you can find a detailed description of the MO, the tools, and the stages these fraud schemes use. There's not much I could add to that. I want to briefly describe here, a different perspective of how and why these scams work, and what can you do to protect yourself. A hi-level, human analysis of the scam and what it stands on.

There are 2 main factors that these operations rely on:
1. The human predisposition to trust
Contrary to popular opinion, most of the scams throughout the world, and throughout time were not accomplished through some complicated technical hacking. In fact as much as 89% are actually social-hacks, or simply called scams. This means that the break-in, the hacking happens at a human level, not at a technical level. In all of the cases the victims of the scams were approached by somebody online, many times throgh dating sites, social media platforms, or chat applications and engaged them in a personal conversation, gaining their trust by empathizing with, often suffering from similar life events, manifesting strong romantic interest or excessive flattery. Afterwards comes the > "making money" proposition. No matter how you look at it, this part is related to common human traits, the same features that make us human: the need for companionship, empathy, sharing personal life events and offcourse the desire to increase our wealth.
We are ALL subject to this!

2. The lack of technical and financial knowledge
Both the tech and the financial world are infinite territories with decades of history, thousands of continuously evolving products and applications and, more than anything very specific and complicated jargon that keeps evolving at the speed of light. Now, when you look at the crypto industry - that is the leading edge of both these worlds put together, [finances & tech intertwined].
No wonder scammers have an easy job impressing and further gaining the trust of their victim by using some specific jargon that most of people don't understand. No wonder the victims submit easily to the operational request of their scammers since they don't understand how these products and services work. They are actually grateful to be "guided through" since they wouldn't know how to do it themselves. Offcourse, the operations I am referring to include transfering large amounts of money to a crypto exchange, converting it to some cryptocurrency and further transferring cryptocurrency to a completely unverified address - from this moment on, the funds are lost, irrecoverable and untraceable. No matter how you see it, this part relates to the victim's admitted ignorace and many times even shame regarding their lack of technical and financial knowledge. The whole world is evolving at increasing speed and we don't have time to catch up with everything that is going on.

There is nothing you can do about 1, we are all human and we will remain so therefore, we will always be susceptible to human emotions and our predisposition to trust, and there will always be bad actors in the world looking to take advantage. The only point that you can do something about is 2: your financial and technical knowledge. In a world that is increasingly relying on technology at every step, and where every second article you read in the media involves money, upgrading your knowledge in these two fields is needed not only to keep you out of trouble but also to enable you to connect to the world around you. I believe that fundamental financial and technical education should be on everyone's agenda today, and it should become mandatory education for the modern citizen. Who knows, taking the right steps might just turn you into a successful investor or at least a good money manager.

If you believe you are being scammed, STOP all communication NOW and read this article: https://www.fbi.gov/how-we-can-help-you/victim-services/national-crimes-and-victim-resources/cryptocurrency-investment-fraud?__cf_chl_tk=UyV.MMtudjq7qUmdn10ZC1HzV55UG9k1NzJj7T1bh9Q-1745426231-1.0.1.1-WVOVRCsFFu0ueVMtkPyPhvSRR.nTJ4vcB.3asKBfAbk

If you want to learn more about crypto, get in touch with me and let's schedule an intro lesson