The founder of the infamous crypto exchange BitConnect, Satish Kumbhani, has been charged for allegedly misleading investors globally and defrauding them of $2.4 billion in the process. According to the Department of Justice (DOJ), a San Diego-based federal grand jury specifically charged Kumbhani for orchestrating the alleged Ponzi scheme via BitConnect’s “Lending Program”: “BitConnect operated as a Ponzi scheme by paying earlier BitConnect investors with money from later investors. In total, Kumbhani and his co-conspirators obtained approximately $2.4 billion from investors.” Back in 2017 amid the hype, BitConnect (BCC) recorded an all-time high of $463.31 in trading price, which according …

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that victims of the Bitconnect Ponzi scheme can proceed with a class action suit by reversing a previous ruling that prohibited such a case. Bitconnect is the endlessly memed ICO from 2017 that collapsed in January, 2018. Appellate courts are superior courts that are used to review previously tried cases so the ruling may be reversed or confirmed. The alleged victims may now move forward with a class action case against BitConnect (BCC) and its promoters Glenn Arcaro, Ryan Maasen, Trevon James, Ryan HiIdreth, and Craig Grant. There is no word yet …

Late Friday afternoon, decentralized finance, or DeFi, investigator @zachxbt published a series of tweets accusing fraudster Omar Zaki of hiding behind the facade of 0xbrainjar, the anonymous head of product at Composable Finance. From last November to this February, Composable Finance raised over $167 million through seed funding, as well as crowdloan auctions on the Polkadot (DOT) and Kusama (KSM) parachains. Over 9,000 participants contributed to the DOT crowdloan alone. As told by zachxbt, who cited documents from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, Omar Zaki, then a 21-year-old New York resident and graduate of Yale University with …

Chainalysis data shows that 4068 criminal whales (roughly 4% of all whales) are hodling more than $25 billion worth of cryptocurrency between them. The blockchain analytics firm defines criminal whales as any private wallet that holds more than $1 million worth of crypto with over 10% of the funds received from illicit addresses tied to activity such as scams, fraud and malware. The data is from the “Criminal Balances” section of the Crypto Crime Report that explores criminal activity on the blockchain over 2021 and early 2022. The wide-ranging report also covers topics such as Ransomware, Malware, Darknet markets and …

Cybercriminals are using bots purchased on Telegram to trick users into giving them access to their cryptocurrency accounts. According to a report from cybersecurity firm Intel471, One Time Password (OTP) bots are “remarkably easy to use” and are relatively inexpensive to operate relative to the amount that can be earned from a successful attack. A Telegram bot known as ‘BloodOTPbot’ charges a monthly fee of just $300 to hackers to access. Fraudsters also have the option to spend an extra $20 to $100 on more phishing tools that target individual social media accounts on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, financial services …

DBS Bank, Singapore’s largest bank, is working on expanding its cryptocurrency exchange beyond its current investor base of institutional clients, according to the CEO. DBS Bank CEO Piyush Gupta spoke of the bank’s cryptocurrency business during the Q4 2021 earnings call on Monday, stating that the company will focus on measures to further scale its crypto exchange operations in 2022. During the call, Gupta was asked whether DBS Bank has a roadmap for rolling out digital asset trading to retail investors. While the CEO did not provide a straightforward answer, he still said that DBS Bank did initiate some work …

Nonfungible tokens (NFT) have taken the world by storm, resulting in mainstream interest and greater adoption of cryptocurrency. According to blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis, NFT popularity skyrocketed in 2021. Chainalysis’ “NFT Market Report” shows a minimum of $44.2 billion worth of cryptocurrency sent to Ethereum smart contracts associated with NFT marketplaces and collections last year. The report notes that this number was $106 million in 2020. While impressive, increasing scams and fraudulent activities have infiltrated the NFT space. For instance, major NFT marketplace OpenSea recently announced that its free minting tool was prone to misuse. As a result, OpenSea shared …

Australia's consumer and competition (ACCC) watchdog is investigating Facebook’s parent company Meta for a long running series of fraudulent cryptocurrency advertisements of the platform. The news comes just a day after Cointelegraph reported that billionaire businessman Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest was pursuing criminal action against the social media giant for allegedly serving users crypto scam ads and fake articles which used his name and likeness. Numerous other high profile celebrities from Hugh Jackman to Nicole Kidman have been fraudulently employed to draw users into investment scams. The ACCC alleges that Meta allowed the crypto scammers to breach Australian consumer law, defrauding …

On Wednesday, American Youtuber and "internet detective" Coffeezillaa published a recorded interview of himself and disgraced Youtuber Paul "Ice Poseidon" Denino. During the session, Denino allegedly confirmed that he made off with $750k worth of his investors' money through rug pulling a crypto project dubbed "Cxcoin." The ordeal started last July, when Denino created the Cxcoin for streamers and content creators on the Binance Smart Chain. Denino then allegedly promoted the coin to his community of followers, telling them that "don't worry, no rug [pull] here all the money is locked [in a smart contract] lol, my wallets are pinned." …

How to avoid cryptocurrency scams? One of the best ways to protect your crypto investment is to secure a wallet and do your own research about the projects in the market. Don't believe everything you're told. Instead, examine any claims made about investment, especially if they appear too good to be true or promise huge returns in a short period. Also, do not trust anyone who contacts you personally, whether a government official, a public personality, or a stranger, and asks for Bitcoin payments or offers you an "investment opportunity." Whenever possible, enable two-factor authentication on your cryptocurrency wallet and …

A top special agent from the Internal Revenue Service has told a conference that NFTs and crypto are the “future” but highlighted that fraud and manipulation is still rampant in the space. Ryan Korner from the IRS Criminal Investigation’s Los Angeles field office made the comments virtual event held on Tuesday by the USC Gould School of Law, Korner. Bloomberg reports Korner said: “We’re just seeing mountains and mountains of fraud in this area.” He told the event the IRS CI division acknowledges the significant growth of the crypto sector, but noted that the usage of digital assets has not …

The National Cyber-Forensics and Training Alliance (NCFTA), an American non-profit, onboarded its first crypto firm Binance to aid their ongoing battle against cybercrimes. Founded in 2002, the NCFTA partners with law enforcement and various business and academic entities to source threat intelligence to identify and mitigate cybercrime threats. By partnering with Binance, the world’s biggest crypto exchange in terms of trading volume, the NCFTA aims to tackle international cybersecurity investigations. According to Binance’s VP of Global Intelligence and Investigations, Tigran Gambaryan, the exchange aims to be the leading contributor in the fight against cybercrime, ransomware, and terrorism financing: “Joining the …