Bitcoin Forum

Scammers conned $50,000 out of regular Australians using a blatantly obvious fake tax debt fraud. Multiple victims have been lured into paying off non-existent debt through Bitcoin ATMs.

A TIME-TESTED SCAM
Scammers have managed to con upwards of $50,000 from Australian citizens, luring them in to pay off a non-existent debt in a classic fraud. At least four victims from eastern Melbourne have fallen for the trick, local news media reports.

Purportedly, the scammers would call the victims and convince them that they have an outstanding tax debt and that, if they don’t pay it through a Bitcoin ATM in Braybrook, they will be jailed. The victims would then withdraw their savings from their bank accounts, travel to Brabryook’s Bitcoin ATM and pay off the fake debt to a specified Bitcoin account.

According to the police, this type of scheme targets vulnerable people who are easily convinced that their immigration status is threatened.

Notes Acting Detective Sergeant Katherine Lehpamer:

We believe that there are a number of victims out there who have not reported the matter for one reason or another, they may be here on visas or they are not aware that authorities would never tell them to deposit money into an ATM.

Bitcoin ATMs Spring up Across Utah... ish

COMPLETE LACK OF AWARENESS
Authorities have more than once urged for individuals to be particularly careful when getting phone calls from institutions and to double-check with the relevant organizations the merit of the claims. Sergeant Lehpamer notes on the matter:

Anyone getting a call along these lines should make enquiries with the relevant authority before paying any money or giving any banking or personal details over the phone.

What is shocking, though, is that Australia doesn’t even accept tax payments made in cryptocurrencies. While there are certain projects which allow citizens to pay their bills with digital currencies, they simply act as intermediaries handling the bills on behalf of the user after receiving the same amount in cryptocurrencies.

                                ---What do you think of the fake tax debt scam? Don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments below!---

Well, it was just a matter of time before people figured out how to use Bitcoin ATM's as a method to scam people. The old tax

scam is nothing new, these guys used credit cards and Bank accounts before, so they just shifted to a payment method that

are more anonymous. There are virtually nothing that ATM manufacturers can do to stop this and Bitcoin cannot be blamed

for people's stupidity.  ::)

please note that scammers will try various things to get money, and the next is bitcoin has not really been accepted in Australia, that ordinary people are very easy to be deceived, this can be a lesson for us together so that it is not easy to be fooled.

It seems that this will have no effect on the price of bitcoin because Australia itself has not actually received bitcoin as a legal cryptocurrency in the country.

Complete Lack of Awareness - you pointed out the main thing about getting scammed. most people jumped into bitcoin without proper knowlwdge of basic cyber security and they are being easily phished, scammed etc. What we need is to help newbies providing basic web & cyber security, but there are many posts about those baby steps - we can't force anybody to read, right?

Exactly! As much as I love the technical expansions of bitcoins in the real-life scenarios, I feel equally sad for the security that these projects compromise. Bitcoin ATM sounds fancy but imagine the sacrifices one would make doing transactions on a public machine. You never know what sort of data they might store after your transactions.

Scamming is not isolated to Bitcoins only. People are constantly being scammed even within the conventional digital currency realm. It is always advised to look for the minute differences while transacting.

This type of classic scams, whether in credit cards or bank deposits, happens every often. What makes me sad is, some people still fall into these traps. Everyone should seriously go through the do's and dont's of cyber world.

It is very sad to hear the news. Some people will try to find a way to scam others using any means necessary, bitcoin atm is not a exception. It is advised to be careful and research thoroughly before paying off others.

The fact that Australia doesn't even accept tax payments through bitcoin makes it more sad. This is nothing but a total lack of awareness. People need to be more cautious about the crypto security.

Difficult to believe that anyone would ever fall for such a scam - it is totally unlausible. And people who would fall for such a scam would probably not have any idea on how to make a Bitcoin payment.

yes that is true, before fraudsters have stolen money with credit cards and bank accounts through their ATMs, no one really can handle this case. sometimes thieves are smarter than their victims. and there is nothing wrong with bitcoin. only human error :P

That is very unfortunate and regrettable. It is a notable lesson for us especially as it has to do with cryptocurrency. Though, tricks of this nature are not limited to cryptocurrencies, it can happen with fiat currencies. One important factor is - always investigate before parting with your hard earned money. Very important to double check. Make a call to genuine source to confirm if such is true.

Scams everywhere, it is quite unfortunate how some of  these situations are happening to well minded people who have good intentions for  the world of crypto. I believe much education is needed to educate people on how to identify potential scams when new technological developments such as bitcoin ATMs are brought up.

Well, the scammers could scam in anywhere,the blame shouldn't fall upon the exchange medium in that case. Also one should've been careful while dealing with crypto as the risks are there and known to all.

As you have pointed, 'lack of awareness' is one of the major reason behind people being scammed. A majority of people jumps into investing on crypto currency without any proper knowledge or idea of this marke. As a result they become a easy prey of the Scamming.

undeniably, even though nowadays there are many, even they are smarter and more cunning, they possess every field, even now they use atm networks too. that means we must increase our awareness and always be more careful of anyone who is suspicious ... !!

OP you should post link to this news, this way of writing post is falls into the category of plagiarism and your account can be banned.

Regarding news, I must say that human imagination has no boundaries - this is very well prepared operation which target immigrants and play on their status in country. The culprit for this fraud can be anyone, but it is very likely that he had access to the data about immigrants and their income. Since victims are call by phone, police should start from that, maybe they can track scammers in case they are not too smart to use burner phones.

This is just another proof that people can easily be deceived, and with help of cryptocurrency scammers often manage to successfully hide traces.

People perish cause of lack on knowledge,  that is why we all need to read and have understanding of what is going on in the world.  Falling for such scam in this century is funny.

This is simply a scam and has nothing to do with bitcoins just that the Scammers decided to cashout their so called earning through bitcoins. With a lot of scams going on , I thought less people are going to fall for these kind of scams but they still do.

Whenever money is involved, there is some space for scam. I hope that the scammers or fraud people are caught by the authorities.

Another problem that I think is very acute in this case is that there is no one telling people how to remain safe from crypto related scam. That is very much needed especially in developing countries.

Thanks for making people aware of this issue. I have been using the ATM's couple of times and didn't know of this fraud scheme.

JUst wanna ask what is the  main reason why this bitcoin atm still on action?when theres no need to purchase or withdraw from this atm as many option to do same thing.

Theres alot of local wallets that can directly purchase and send bitcoin .sorry if this is not an answer to OPs topic but i think this is relevant to the issue as bitcoin ATM is concerning this scamming

Hello,

Really sad that these kind of scams still manage to grap people. It is not only a BTC problem but a general scam problem because it could be used under all the money forms, fiat, BTC, cryptos or whatever.

Best is to again and again try to spread the word to explain more to people how to don't fall inside it.

This was a very shocking thing was happened with Australian people. Now scammers use a different kind of strategies for scamming. But you are doing well by spreading the information throughout this platform towards the people. Now many users will get aware about this thing because of your update.

With all these people with bad intentions keeps flooding the crypto space, it becomes hard everyday to argue against the use of KYCs by every service providers in the crypto industry. How can people focus on vulnerable people in the society who income is not enough for them and wanting to do the right thing with the law which is why they are in the position of weakness that the society has put them only to be robbed of their resources by those who wants to make wealth and flaunt it on social media, clubs, casinos etc.

With adequate KYC, I believe this people can be made to pay for their as it on an ATM that the provider is expected every thing done on their ATM is traceable and the moment this cannot be done, we should stop deceiving ourselves about bitcoin going mainstream because things like this are what decisions makers would continue to rely upon to wage war against crypto.

Scammers never rest. They try new things constantly until they get our attention. Having proper knowledge about security and being aware of this scams is very important.

The use of one Bitcoin address by scammers provides an excellent opportunity to track transactions on it and get off on the trail of criminals. In addition, there is a possibility to track the places and phone numbers from where the call was made to the victims.

Quite shocking that people will fall for these types of scams, there needs to be an awareness campaign to ensure that people don't feed the scammers. Perhaps some notices on the bitcoin ATM machines

I agree with you. the government must regulate crypto. so that regulations made by the government can save their assets. and I think preventive action is better. but unfortunately. some governments choose to reject crypto. in my opinion crypto growth in Australia is still not perfect. and the Australian government doesn't care about crypto.

If in Australia it is not so widespread with bitcoin why is there bitcoin atm? this is what invites scammers to easily get their prey. It's better to be careful and watch out for all crime, especially bitcoin is known as the most expensive and easy investment to be hacked.

This is a classic scam being carried out with a new payment option that is just more anonymous and thus safe for scammers.  Earlier this was done through bank transfers or card payments but there was a risk of getting caught as those payments can be easily traced back to original reciever.

we need to have be careful when invest to unknow projects

Your title made me a bit off, i thought peoples have been scammed by bitcoin ATM.
Well, if some peoples or companies tell you to send your money to their btc address, mostly they are scammers.
The official company or government won't using btc address to hide their existence.

yes, scammers are getting innovative day by day, only caution can help a person to stop being into scammed.