The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the United States warned citizens about a new scam crypto job ad that has been in recent circulation.
On May 22, the FBI issued a warning saying U.S. citizens and individuals living or traveling abroad should be aware of false job advertisements linked to labor trafficking.
According to the ad, victims have been “held against their will, intimidated, and forced to commit international cryptocurrency investment fraud schemes.”
The warning continue by saying that victims have been primarily targeted in Asia, and are offered a wide range of opportunities including tech support, call center customer service, and beauty salon technicians. However, upon arrival in a foreign country, job seekers are “coerced” into committing cryptocurrency investment schemes.
Victims of such schemes have been asked by the FBI to come forward and report the activity through an online portal.
The FBI has been involved in numerous cases involving cryptocurrency scams and crypto-related incidents in recent years.
Most recently, on May 1, the Detroit Field Office of the FBI, along with the National Police of Ukraine “conducted coordinated, court-authorized activity” which concluded with nine virtual currency exchange services having their domains seized and shut down.
The domains were allegedly aiding cybercriminals and included 24xbtc.com, 100btc.pro, pridechange.com, trust-exchange.org and bitcoin24.exchange, among others.
On April 30, crypto security and auditing firm CertiK released a round-up of April’s crypto exploits and scams which revealed a loss of $103.7 million. The amount lost in April equaled half of all the crypto exploited so far in 2023.
Around that same time, the prominent YouTuber DidYouKnowGaming was the victim of an ongoing hack that promoted XRP cryptocurrency scams.
