[ad_1]
The California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) issued 17 separate warnings in two days to cryptocurrency brokers and websites suspected of being fraudulent.
The list includes Tahoe Digital Exchange, TeleTrade Options, Tony Alin Trading Firm, Hekamenltd/Tosal Markets Limited, Trade 1960, Yong Ying Global Investment Company Limited, Unison FX, VoyanX.com, ZC Exchange and others.
Additionally, there are two copycat sites masquerading as two big names in the cryptocurrency sector. eth-Wintermute.net and UniSwap LLC.
At the time of this writing, the DFPI’s consumer warnings page lists 17 warnings on December 27th and December 28th, alleging that these companies have been “suspected for fraud against California consumers.” It appears to be involved,” he said.
It is unusual for the DFPI to post this many alerts at once, suggesting that the number of crypto fraud reports may have increased later in the year. DFPI typically posts sporadic warnings of investigations to businesses, or alerts of specific incidents.
The last time DFPI sent out such a high volume of cryptocurrency fraud alerts was on June 15th, alerting 26 questionable cryptocurrency platforms.
The alerts respond to citizen complaints against brokers and websites, with the DFPI saying individuals have reported losing between $2,000 and up to $1.2 million in certain cases. However, DFPI only states that these websites “appear to be involved in fraud.”
A key theme asserted in most of these warnings relates to pig slaughter fraud. This includes individuals or groups creating fake identities online and building fake relationships or friendships through social media, messaging, and dating apps.
In pig slaughter and romance scams, scammers typically spend weeks or months building a fake kinship relationship to gain the victim’s trust, before gradually shifting the conversation to investing and investing. lure them with the “opportunity” of .
The ultimate goal is to provide the victim with cryptocurrency via a mimicked version of a legitimate website (such as UniSwap LLC or eth-Wintermute.net in this case) or by transferring funds to a dodgy wallet address. is to invest in
Along with the pig slaughter, scammers are said to have deployed another tactic called the “advance payment scheme,” demanding large sums of money to process bogus withdrawals from fraudulent sites.
If the victim is tricked into it, the crooks not only pocket the initial investment, but add an extra slice and then immediately cut off all forms of contact.
Related: Scammers impersonate US State Department claiming to help affected FTX users
“DFPI urges consumers to exercise extreme caution before accepting any solicitation to provide investment or financial services. To verify whether an investment or financial service provider is licensed in California. said DFPI.
[ad_2]
Source link