Top 5 Scam Report Locations (2020) Scam Report Country of Originī Top 5 Countries Originating Bitcoin Scam Reports in 2020Īlmost half (~46%) of scam victims were located in the United States, Canada or the United Kingdom. 25 countries originated at least 100 reports. *Not including the bitcoin address from the July Twitter hack bc1qxy2kgdygjrsqtzq2n0yrf2493p83kkfjhx0wlhĢ020 Scam Report Originsīased on the origins of Scam Reports received by in 2020, bitcoin scams are the world’s other continuing pandemic.īitcoinWhosWho received Scam Reports from 149 countries in 2020.

Top 25 Most Frequently Reported Bitcoin Scam Addresses of 2020 Bitcoin Address

There are many variations of the scam, but basically claims to have webcam footage of the email recipient visiting adult websites and demands payment in bitcoin or else the video will be sent to their contacts. The Top 25 Most Frequently Reported Bitcoin Scam Addresses to in 2020* received 9.5994793 total BTC.Įvery single address is associated with the “sextortion” email scam first reported here in March 2018. While these actions by FinCEN are laudable, neither Helix nor Coin Ninja was among the most popular mixers being used today, so the actual impact on the number of bitcoin scams is likely to be quite limited. Harmon is in addition to the ongoing criminal money laundering charges against him. Although mixers are used for various non-criminal purposes, many scammers will utilize them in order to better hide their identities. Since the exchange has the account holder’s personal information, they can be forced to reveal it if there’s a crime involved.īitcoin mixers or tumblers are used to obscure the trail of transactions to make it more difficult to track them to the endpoint.

Larry Dean Harmon was fined $60 million for operating as an unregistered money services business, since he was deliberately operating as an exchange without first registering with FinCEN.Īlthough bitcoin is designed to be anonymous, it’s sometimes possible (using tools like Bitcoin Who’s Who) to track transactions until they result in a “withdrawal” via a crypto exchange. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) fined the founder of cryptocurrency “mixers” Helix and Coin Ninja this week for violations of the Bank Secrecy Act, an action that may signal more serious enforcement actions against bitcoin scams in the future.

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