SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
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Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#2> “ Despite cease-and-desist actions against Forsage for operating as a fraud in September 2020 by the Securities and Exchange Commission of the Philippines and in March 2021 by the Montana Commissioner of Securities and Insurance, the defendants allegedly continued to promote the scheme while denying the claims in several YouTube videos and by other means.”
Even now, the site Forsage.io is live, and claims that 2,559 people joined the past 24 hours. Who knows if it’s true.
But how does this work: when a site like this is charged with fraud, can it operate until there is a verdict, defrauding more unsuspecting victims? Needless to say, visitors to the site will have know knowledge of this lawsuit.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#374 votes and a single comment, I think that is record high ratio.
The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged 11 individuals for their roles in creating and promoting Forsage, a fraudulent crypto pyramid and Ponzi scheme that raised more than $300 million from millions of retail investors worldwide, including in the United States. Those charged include the four founders of Forsage, who were last known to be living in Russia, the Republic of Georgia, and Indonesia, as well as three U.S.-based promoters engaged by the founders to endorse Forsage on its website and social media platforms, and several members of the so-called Crypto Crusaders—the largest promotional group for the scheme that operated in the United States from at least five different states.
I never heard of it. For some reason despite following crypto closely I have never heard to 90% of these frauds despite the frauds being so big. Maybe the fraud is some weird front for money laundering, so they don't try to promote it much.
Also , no end to the YouTube scam livestreams. For some reason, YouTube Saylor and Musk giveaway scams stay under radar forever (no arrests, no indictments) despite many arrests and indictments for other frauds, like ransomware, mlm, insider trading (coinbase & opensea). Goes to show how some scams and criminals are better than others.
Interesting
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#474 votes and a single comment, I think that is record high ratio. The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged 11 individuals for their roles in creating and promoting Forsage, a fraudulent crypto pyramid and Ponzi scheme that raised more than $300 million from millions of retail investors worldwide, including in the United States. Those charged include the four founders of Forsage, who were last known to be…
> YouTube Saylor and Musk giveaway scams
I think I saw one of these once. It involved an atrocious (but still somehow impressive) deepfake of Musk. Is this common?
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#5> “ Despite cease-and-desist actions against Forsage for operating as a fraud in September 2020 by the Securities and Exchange Commission of the Philippines and in March 2021 by the Montana Commissioner of Securities and Insurance, the defendants allegedly continued to promote the scheme while denying the claims in several YouTube videos and by other means.” Even now, the site Forsage.io is live, and claims that 2,55…
I doubt the Filipino SEC or the Montana whatever office has the ability. The US SEC doesn’t prosecute but they can give information to Federal Prosecutors. My guess is they don’t have the legal authority or capability to do those things.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#674 votes and a single comment, I think that is record high ratio. The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged 11 individuals for their roles in creating and promoting Forsage, a fraudulent crypto pyramid and Ponzi scheme that raised more than $300 million from millions of retail investors worldwide, including in the United States. Those charged include the four founders of Forsage, who were last known to be…
> YouTube Saylor and Musk giveaway scams I think I saw one of these once. It involved an atrocious (but still somehow impressive) deepfake of Musk. Is this common?
No idea about the deepfake thing, but a few years ago I noticed a whole bunch of old channels that I had subscribed to were taken over and replaced with Musk-related giveaway scams. Never watched any of the videos or livestreams - the title, thumbnail and (renamed) channel name were enough to make it obviously scams.
Youtube is incredibly slow to respond to these kinds of things.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#774 votes and a single comment, I think that is record high ratio. The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged 11 individuals for their roles in creating and promoting Forsage, a fraudulent crypto pyramid and Ponzi scheme that raised more than $300 million from millions of retail investors worldwide, including in the United States. Those charged include the four founders of Forsage, who were last known to be…
> YouTube Saylor and Musk giveaway scams I think I saw one of these once. It involved an atrocious (but still somehow impressive) deepfake of Musk. Is this common?
They're very common; I've seen a dozen or more. The ones I've seen don't look like deepfakes; they're random Elon Musk or Cathie Wood videos with a URL for a scam site superimposed.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#8I mean, it's some progress, I guess.
How long until the US Gov goes after all the folks who keep doing pump & dump/"rug pull" b.s with new coins? There seems to be a never-ending trail of those.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#9I mean, it's some progress, I guess. How long until the US Gov goes after all the folks who keep doing pump & dump/"rug pull" b.s with new coins? There seems to be a never-ending trail of those.
It's not super clear but it seems like that's essentially part of what they're being charged for and was behind the first C&D?
I do think there's a lot more underway and coming.
Re: SEC Charges Eleven Individuals in $300M Crypto Pyramid Scheme
#1074 votes and a single comment, I think that is record high ratio. The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged 11 individuals for their roles in creating and promoting Forsage, a fraudulent crypto pyramid and Ponzi scheme that raised more than $300 million from millions of retail investors worldwide, including in the United States. Those charged include the four founders of Forsage, who were last known to be…
> YouTube Saylor and Musk giveaway scams I think I saw one of these once. It involved an atrocious (but still somehow impressive) deepfake of Musk. Is this common?
They are getting very creative too. There is a common bot scam nowadays where it will ask for help and share private keys of a crypto wallet with money inside it.
The catch is to transfer those tokens from the crypto wallet, you have to fund it with native token to pay the gas fee. When you do, the gas fees is automatically sniped by the bot and stolen.
Another interesting one I've come across is where scammers plant obvious bot tweets and then other bots call them out to upsell security services by a random account which then setup a similar trap.
It's amusing to watch. I might fall for some of them if I wasn't aware of them. I can't imagine an average person not getting fished.