<story><title>Crypto leads to surge in online scams</title><url>https://www.axios.com/crypto-scam-ftc-2079c3b2-6237-4ff8-92f2-d08382cd0d70.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>Animats</author><text>The real question is, will the big cryptocurrencies hold? Bitcoin is down almost half from its peak, but it&amp;#x27;s done that before. What&amp;#x27;s different this time is that more countries, especially China, have banned cryptocurrency operations. Hard to say.&lt;p&gt;At some point, Tether is going to crack. The backing isn&amp;#x27;t there, and everybody knows it now.
It can&amp;#x27;t survive a net outflow. It&amp;#x27;s still possible to exit Tether for another stablecoin. USDT and USDC are still trading at 1:1. You can redeem USDC for US dollars. So if you own USDT, get out while you can.  When stablecoins crash, they crash all the way to zero.&lt;p&gt;The SEC continues to bring enforcement actions. 97 so far in the cryptocurrency area.[1] Most recently, &amp;quot;Gold Hawgs&amp;quot;. &amp;quot;Instead of using all of the investor funds to develop Gold Hawgs&amp;#x27; business, Garcia, the chief financial officer and a 50% owner of the company, allegedly stole approximately $123,000 of the money raised from investors by transferring the funds to another company that he controlled; he then allegedly used the money to pay for various personal and business expenses unrelated to Gold Hawgs.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Before that, &amp;quot;Crowd Machine&amp;quot;: &amp;quot;In this offering, which occurred between January and April 2018, Sproule told investors that the ICO proceeds would be used to develop a new technology that would enable Metavine, Inc.’s existing application-development software to run on a decentralized network of users’ own computers. Instead, Crowd Machine and Sproule began diverting more than $5.8 million in ICO proceeds to gold mining entities in South Africa – a use that was never disclosed to investors.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Before that, &amp;quot;Denaro&amp;quot;: &amp;quot;Auzins misappropriated all of the ICO’s proceeds.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Before that, &amp;quot;MyMicroProfits&amp;quot;: &amp;quot;Defendant Ryan Ginster allegedly engaged in a fraudulent scheme raising millions in cryptocurrency using online investment programs and then converted the cryptocurrency for his own benefit,&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Totally ordinary con game rip-offs. Only the hype is new.&lt;p&gt;It looks like 2022 will be the big shakeout year for NFTs and the low end of cryptocurrencies.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.sec.gov&amp;#x2F;spotlight&amp;#x2F;cybersecurity-enforcement-actions&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.sec.gov&amp;#x2F;spotlight&amp;#x2F;cybersecurity-enforcement-acti...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Crypto leads to surge in online scams</title><url>https://www.axios.com/crypto-scam-ftc-2079c3b2-6237-4ff8-92f2-d08382cd0d70.html</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>explaingarlic</author><text>I don&amp;#x27;t understand this at all. Shouldn&amp;#x27;t &amp;quot;cryptocurrency&amp;quot; - I.E. currency based on an understanding of computational complexity and a view into abstract mathematics - appeal to those that have a vague idea of what their money is most-physically represented by?&lt;p&gt;If so, then why are these logically refutable scams (&amp;quot;Give me 1btc and I&amp;#x27;ll send you 3btc back!!!&amp;quot;: Just think that the person would, if they can generate 4btc of value out their ass like that, simply likely keep it, whether they valued the fiat value of it or not) so common?&lt;p&gt;I understand the idea that the emotional gain from giving something to someone who has never had anything of that value may be overwhelmingly tempting or fulfilling on the &amp;quot;giver&amp;#x27;s&amp;quot; part but similarly, aren&amp;#x27;t there people more deserving of this than &lt;i&gt;you&lt;/i&gt;, the &amp;quot;scam&amp;quot; victim? At that point, I don&amp;#x27;t even know if I would call it a scam.&lt;p&gt;If someone posed as a verified conveyancer and built a fake profile, payed legitimate businesses and entities off for positive testimonials etc. And encouraged me to hire them to re-mortgage my property for me then I would call that a scam - but someone asking for money with the vague promise that &amp;quot;they need it more than you&amp;quot; not so, similarly not with a &amp;quot;I will give you double the money you give me&amp;quot; scheme. It just feels more like something so stupid that you are entirely at fault if you fall for it.</text></comment>