Since cryptocurrency users continue to increase, many people are exposed to it. At the same time, there is also an increase in scams in the market, which usually always fall victim to the newbies in the crypto space. And this is happening because nothing is happening in the regulation here in cryptocurrency. So crypto is one of the high-risk assets in the market. So the opportunity here is way higher than we expect. "If there is an opportunity there is always a risk"
Now let's talk about the crypto scam that rocked cryptocurrency. So the only one I covered was the biggest crypto scam, the one with the biggest stolen amount. Because we all know that there are many scams in the crypto world.
PLEXCOINIt was launched in August 2017 and raised 8.5M$ through ICO. They say it will be used for maintaining the Plexcoin, Infrastructure, and for the future development of products and services. They also have promises to their investors of 1354% Return(ROI) within 29 days on investment, And it is stated in their whitepaper.
They also claimed that they have a global team of financial and managerial experts based in Singapore.
It is a Ponzi scheme, so its founders are all residents of Canada, Lacroix, Paradis-Royer, and Ouellet were charged in 2020 with Security Fraud, Wire Fraud, and Money laundering.
Source:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/three-individuals-behind-alleged-plexcoin-ico-scam-charged-with-fraud
CENTRA TECHIt's a Miami-based company whose purpose is to offer crypto-based financial products such as debit cards, Visa and Mastercard. They claimed that they have a license for 38 estates in money transfer. And there are also celebrities involved in it like Floydmayweather and DjKhaled to promote centra tech ico the centra token, and it was able to raise 25M$ in July 2017. And its founders are Sohrab Sharma and partners Robert Farkas, and Raymond Trapani.
But in the same year of 2017, A project investor filed a Lawsuit, alleging the centra tech had violated security loss when it was able to raise 25m$ from the centra token ico. And in April 2018, the SEC charged them with multi-million dollar Unregistered Securities. It also includes the charged celebrities who were involved like DJ KHALED and MAYWEATHER but they also ended up in a settlement with the U.S security and exchange commission but they neither admitted nor denied their involvement here. And Sohrab Sharma has sentenced to 8 years an illegally conduct ICO and the others involved or partners only got a low sentence.
Source:
https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2021/03/05/centra-tech-co-founder-gets-8-years-for-crypto-fraud/
PINCOINThis, in turn, is one of the Vietnamese cryptocurrency projects that also took advantage of the times of ico mania. It only took away 660M$ from their investors.
How did they do it?
They created an attractive website, convincing whitepaper, social networks, mobile apps, and well-executed documentation. And a company promises a constant return for its investors with a profit rate of 48% per month. And besides that, investors will receive an 8% commission for every new member who enters the network.
The early investors made money from it at first, then the team started to pay rewards with other tokens, the Ifan token because the token they issued aside from Pin coin is the second one. But that token has no value because it was never traded in any exchange, after that the team disappeared and flew to another country. Almost 32k investors bit into this project, that's why they got 660M$ from ico earnings.
Source:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/vietnam-pincoin-ifan-icos-exposed-as-scams-that-allegedly-stole-660-million
BITCONNECTIt is a classic Ponzi scheme, the company started in 2016 and promised a consistently high return. And they say this is possible with blockchain technology, many have invested in this project, and others are defending that it is legit because it started in 2016. And it became one of the best-performing currencies in the coinmarketcap in 2017. There was even an imitator here then, when it was at its peak its market cap even reached 2.6B$, its business model guaranteed return to investors up to 40% per month which is added to the based initial deposit or cash deposited faster.
The company also developed a trading bot and volatility software that would earn your bitcoin into an investment into a fortune. This is what is posted on their website.
If you invest 1000$ in bitconnect, it will net 50M$ within 3 years, assuming that their daily interest of 1% is true and will compound daily. This is where it gets suspicious because there is no guaranteed return in crypto. And experts say that even Buterin said on Twitter that "if 1%/day is what they offer then that's a Ponzi scheme.
Bitcoinnect's attack here is an aggressive marketing strategy. They have a large army of multi-level affiliate marketers to recruit new investors. Think from January 2017 the value of bitconnect was only 0.17$ and it reached 460$ at the end of December 2017. But it didn't take long because the scam was discovered, and they received a cease and decease order from Texas from North Carolina regulators. And the company shut down in January 2018. The reason for the fall in the value of their token is that in September 2021 the top North American promoter of bitconnect, Glen Arcaro, was sentenced to 38 months in prison for defrauding US investors a total of 2B$ who is now probably free,... The founder of bitconnect is Satish Kumbhani but he is nowhere to be found. And it is not in India it is in another country but it is not known where, so its location remains unknown.
[1.]
Bitconnect shutdown[2.]
Bitconnect Fraud
ONECOINThe largest cryptocurrency scam history, it took 4B$ of money from investors. But in other articles that I have read, it is playing with 4B$-15B$ of stolen money from their investors. And they had 3M members around 175 countries. It started in 2014 and its Founder is Dr. Ruja Ignatova or better known as the crypto queen. She claimed that onecoin is a bitcoin killer that can be used for payment. However, there was no onecoin blockchain model in the payment system. It is not even considered a blockchain.
In addition, the company sells educational materials such as courses, and cryptocurrency, this is their main business. There is also Trading and Investing here, and this is part of their multi-level marketing scheme. That the buyers will receive rewards for bringing in participants. course token buyers will also receive a rewards token that can be used to mine onecoin.
Its founder goes to different countries to conduct seminars to attract more investors, Dr. Ruja Ignatova who is a Bulgari national is now included in the most wanted top 10 in the FBI. Because in the year 2017 she left Onecoin, it disappeared like a bubble, and left the company without a word. And until now no one knows where it is. However, even though he left onecoin at that time, its operation continued with the help of his associates, later his brother Konstantin took over as a manager and face of the company.
But in 2016 many countries investigated this and called it a pyramid scheme. In 2018, the onecoin company was raided in Bulgaria, however, it was not until 2017 that Dr. Ruja and 2019 his brother Konstantin were arrested.
Onecoin had never been traded in the market or used to purchase anything. People are wondering how this woman was able to scam millions of people. Those who became members of this onecoin seem to have become a cult. They don't believe what the outside world says and this is what Dr. planted in their brains. Ruja Ignatova. But many people think that maybe it's just hiding or maybe it's getting plastic surgery. And also based on my research, Dr. has done many more scams. Ruja onecoin is still new. I didn't include the other scams. It's up to you to add.
Thanks for reading and taking the time.
[1.]
What is Onecoin?[2.]
Founder most wanted list to FBI[3.]
Co-founder of onecoin was arrested
