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Officers said that this is the biggest amount that they have encountered yet in crypto scams.
Crypto scams have become every other day’s issue given the rising illicit actors in the space. Growing popularity and wide acceptance of cryptocurrencies makes it easier for bad actors to take advantage and trap people with lesser or no knowledge. Similar incident was reported in Michigan where a couple encountered a crypto scam that made them end up losing approx 350K USD.
The Office of Grand Traverse County Sheriff said that an elderly couple in the region became victims of this fraud and they even said this amount to be nearly impossible to trace. Lt. Brandon Brinks, working on the case with the department, said that losing money this way is quite frustrating. It is difficult to watch people fall into traps.
Brinks seemed surprised after looking at the stolen amount and admitted that the amount of 350K USD is the highest he has ever seen. While explaining the case in detail, he said that the couple withdrew multiple times from different banks. Later, they transferred the collected money into a bitcoin ATM—CoinFlip.
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The officer added that the money was sent through different accounts in Western Union, Green Dot and Walmart Gift cards. He said that there could be endless ways of people transferring money after withdrawing from the bank. Detectives during the investigation faced a lot of difficulties in order to track the cash transferred through the bitcoin ATM.
Brinks further outlined that in absence of proper documentation and paperwork, it’s not possible for them to track down the money after it’s gone once. He said that this whole process started with receiving a message stating to call upon a number.
While explaining the procedure of how these scams take place, Brinks said that people believe that when it’s Apple support on the other side, it does not end up Apple support in reality. They often are unknown people from unknown places.
With a background in journalism, Ritika Sharma has worked with many reputed media firms focusing on general news such as politics and crime. She joined The Coin Republic as a reporter for crypto, and found a great passion for cryptocurrency, Web3, NFTs and other digital assets. She spends a lot of time researching and delving deeper into these concepts around the clock, and is a strong advocate for women in STEM.
