Bengaluru Becoming a Safehouse for Crypto Scammers?

[Nrcewker]

Recently the ED raided a place in Bengaluru, raising serious concerns about the city’s growing role in crypto related fraud.

According to the ED as stated by them, an OTC crypto scam worth around $35 million USDT has taken place in Bengaluru.

For those who don’t know what OTC means, it refers to over the counter trading, where assets are traded directly between two parties without going through a main exchange.

In this case investors were lured through Telegram channels and Instagram to invest in and buy coins/tokens at cheap rates. However after receiving the money, the scammers failed to deliver the promised tokens and instead transferred the funds to different wallets. This has also raised suspicions of money laundering.

During the ED raid authorities were able to confiscate around 8,700 USDT from the accused scammers.

With this we can say these are still allegations, and the investigation is ongoing.

But if the case turns out to be true, it certainly raises a serious question Is Bengaluru becoming an high attractive base for crypto scammers because of its large tech/crypto ecosystem and relatively easy money laundering connections?

Would be interested to hear your thoughts on this guys.

The link to the news article can be found here: https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/karnataka/bengaluru-ed-uncovers-35-million-crypto-otc-scam-digital-assets-worth-8700-usdt-seized/article71248638.ece

[Cointikka]

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India is already famous for scams! There are so many YouTube channels exposing scam call centers in India. Indians themselves are scammed; we saw a series on  Netflix dedicated to it known as Jamtara. These scams are not new, and we will see more of such scams in the future. Indians are not less innovative, but they are quite good with jugad innovation, and we have seen how DRDO does it quite efficiently. If an innovative jugad can be combined with a criminal mindset, then a scammer is born  . What I do not understand is how people are still falling for such scams? Is it greed? Or is it being naive?

[Bitcoin Smith]

Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of India, is also known for sophisticated cyber crimes, which doesn't mean it is a safe haven. When the criminals are identified then most likely they will get the treatment compared to other parts but cybersecurity in our country is big joke and we don't even have laws that is protecting the citizen allows the actual hackers to steal money and get away with most of the scams.

India should focus on launching dedicated cyber laws, including privacy rights, which will eliminate most of them.

[Nrcewker]

What I do not understand is how people are still falling for such scams? Is it greed? Or is it being naive?

I would say it is a mixture of both. They become so greedy that they also become naive and start believing in these fake and scam projects. They need to understand that when the returns are too high and seem too good to be true there is probably something fishy going on in the background.

I think this is a similar type of scam to what used to happen back in 2018–19. Every day or two there would be an ICO that is Initial Coin Offering promising people the opportunity to buy newly launched coins/tokens at a cheap price. But once people pay them the developers would disappear. Sadly, we Indian people failed to identify the scam this time.

India should focus on launching dedicated cyber laws, including privacy rights, which will eliminate most of them.

First they should make laws to prevent paper leaks. Recently, the UGC NET exam paper was also leaked and they are still unable to publish the results. The government has a huge bunch of task to complete, so let’s see what happens next.

[Bitcoin Smith]

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But once people pay them the developers would disappear. Sadly, we Indian people failed to identify the scam this time.
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Even till now, people are falling for Ponzi schemes, which doesn't happen once but they go back to a similar kind of investment idea again even after they have been scammed previously. And again, our government don't have laws that restrict people from doing such schemes; that is why we can see those type of investment schemes promoted by social media influencers with millions of followers, back in the day even actors used to do that but a lot of cases filed against them forced them out of these ads and then later the so-called social media influencers took the job.

Indian middle class got the dream of becoming rich but they are easy to manipulate, mislead and they have the disease of short term memory loss which all combined makes this big country is more suitable place to excute any scams if they want.