1. Investment
Of all the investment scams, cryptocurrency was the worst. According to the report, more people were affected by crypto-related scams and the financial impact was much higher.
To put it into context, the total investment fraud was $3.6 billion and crypto fraud accounted for more than $2.5 billion of the total. The increase in overall investment fraud from 2021 to 2022 was substantial, reaching a 127% increase in a year while cryptocurrency investment fraud rose by 183% in that same time frame.
The remaining investment scams included:
Liquidity Mining — People link their crypto wallet to a fraudulent liquidity mining application, and their entire funds are wiped out.
Hacked Social Media Accounts — Scammers will hack the user’s social media account and use cryptocurrency to engage another user and encourage them to invest before stealing their money.
Real Estate Professionals — A scammer will contact a real estate agent and offer to buy a property worth millions of dollars for cash or cryptocurrency.
Employment — A fraudulent job listing will be posted online but instead of offering the applicants a position, they are offered investment advice. This allows the scammer to get as much money as possible from the victim.
