More than 1,200 people complain to ACCC about Bitcoin scams

[alyssa85]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-02-19/more-than-1200-people-complain-to-accc-about-bitcoin-scams/9462240

New figures show more than 1,200 Australians complained to the national consumer watchdog about cryptocurrency scams last year.

[We] obtained the latest figures from the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission's (ACCC) Scamwatch, showing it received 1,289 complaints related to Bitcoin in 2017, with reported losses totalling $1,218,206.

The corporate regulator, Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), has issued a warning to would-be investors.

"These are quite speculative products and they can be quite high-risk," ASIC commissioner John Price told [us].

"It's been quite well documented that some of these products are scams, so please don't invest unless you're prepared to lose some or all of your money."

Unregulated exchanges are also a problem.

Australia's population is only 24 million, and likely no more than a few hundred thousand are into bitcoin, so these are quite a lot of complaints.

[preshpr1nce]

I almost feel like putting in one for CoinJar, massive markups on their altcoins while advertising no such thing, check out Ethereum prices there vs say coinbase or others, it's a good 10% higher

[coingrowth]

Complaining about bitcoin scams will bring awareness to people only to invest in the technology rather than investing in fake icos and mlm programs

[tyuner4]

To be frank, there are scams about other traditional investments such as forex, gold and more. It shows that BTC is a promising investment that attracts scammers.

Complaining about bitcoin scams will bring awareness to people only to invest in the technology rather than investing in fake icos and mlm programs

I agree that it bring awareness to people about scam crypto and to certain extend it is good.

[tomahawk9]

from the article: "1,200 Australians complained to the national consumer watchdog about cryptocurrency scams last year."
So it's not only bitcoin but also altcoins that people are complaining about, yet they decided to use "Bitcoin scams" as the headline...talk about an agenda.

"We've had a lot of cooperation from the cryptocurrencies because they know they need to be legitimate"
and which cryptocurrencies are those? they should at least name those cryptos so that people can feel somewhat 'safe' when investing in them.

AUSTRAC's Brad Brown says there's still a threat of cryptocurrencies being used to finance organised crime and terrorism..
same old story the media uses to attack cryptocurrencies.

"bitcoin bubble is about to burst."
this is when I stopped reading. They are adressing the issue of unregulated exchanges but, to be honest, this looks like another lame article trying to spread FUD.