The Miami Field Office of the United States-based Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has cautioned about the crypto ATMs’ growing usage in scamming activities aiming at receiving funds from the victims.
A public warning was issued in which the respective information was disclosed. It was mentioned in the report that the scammers pretend to be the long-lost friends of the targets or sometimes likely romantic partners and take away the money.
FBI Issues Warning Regarding Scams Done via Crypto ATMs
In this respect, scammers boost their targets by showing extraordinary concern and interest to show that they are loyal to them. After that, they gradually present their investment-related discussions to loot their victims.
The FBI took the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) as its collaborator for this public service declaration, saying that there is generally no chance for the victims of such crypto scams to get their funds back.
Nonetheless, it was noted by the FBI that the agency has noticed the number of those scammers has been escalating who persuade their targets to convert their funds through crypto ATMs, in addition to the other prominent methods taking into account prepaid cards and wire transactions.
Fraudsters Persuade Victims to buy Prepaid Cards or Use Crypto ATMs for Funds Transfer
It also mentioned that several of the defrauded people have reported being instructed to buy prepaid cards in a great amount or carry out wire transfers to some overseas accounts. Using crypto ATMs and cryptocurrency is additionally becoming a more and more widely operated payment method. Individual losses dealing with such schemes count up to a worth of several million dollars.
As revealed by the FBI, the exploiters instruct their targets to keep on making continuous deposits. After that, when the respective depositors attempt to cash out the investments made by them, they get a message that there is a requirement to recompense additional charges or taxes, leading them toward the loss of more funds.
Within the United States, there are up to 33,500 crypto ATMs, as per the data expressed by Coin ATM Radar.
In this respect, the US accounts for the worldwide ATM distribution’s nearly 87.4%. As per the US-based Federal Trade Commission’s warning dealing with crypto ATM frauds, scammers sometimes pretend to be the likely romantic partners.
To deal with this, the FBI encouraged people to check if an investment opportunity is valid before moving further.