ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Cryptocurrency, also known as digital cash, such as Bitcoin, is still growing, and so are the scams. Hackers are not only stealing money, but also social media accounts.
Countney Werning is an investor fraud attorney and principal at Meyer Wilson Werning. She has seen her share of crypto scams and has helped victims of fraud recover millions of dollars. She says one of the latest scams happening worldwide is social media crypto marketing scams.
“These influencers that have been hacked promoting this crypto when it turns out to be a link and your sending money into a void and it is really just a scammer taking your money. We are seeing a tremendous amount of that. Most of the assets that are lost, start with some form of social media,” said Werning. “I am tech forward, but it concerns me how prevalent the growth of crypto currency fraud is.”
Retired Rochester police investigator Dave Simpson, host of The Crime Dawg podcast, says crypto marketing hackers took over his X account and are posting fake crypto messages to all his followers.
“They keep telling me they can’t verify my account because what happens is they hack your password and your email, so my email is not even affiliated with my name anymore. They have total control over it,” said Simpson.
“When they hijack a real person’s account to push a crypto scam, it is super successful because these people that are on your account they think they are hearing from you and so in that way, they weaponize your credibility and the influencer’s credibility to defraud their entire network.
This is happening all over the place. I think the FTC is quoting almost $2 billion in social media scams within the 2024 stats, which is a tremendous increase in recent years. So, this is very prevalent and widespread,” said Werning.
Werning encourages everyone to pause and hover over a link before opening it to see where it’s coming from and to use two-factor authentication apps to help keep all accounts more secure. If you’ve lost money in a crypto scam, you are encouraged to call your local police department to report it. You can also file a report online at the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center.