- There was a 60% rise in scams from last year, as citizens lost $14 million in 2022.
- Crypto scams are believed to be “vastly underreported,” authorities believed.
Citizens in Calgary, Alberta, have lost $22.5 million to 340 reported crypto scams in 2023 so far, said Canadian police. It signified a rise of 60% from last year, as citizens lost nearly $14 million to 321 reported crypto scams in 2022.
Crypto scams are believed to be “vastly underreported,” authorities believed.
The City of Calgary local government revealed these details on 17 October, during the third week of Cyber Security Awareness Month.
The police said that even as a large majority of cryptocurrency is legitimate, scammers frequently use it due to it being a deregulated marketplace. It also warned against online investment offers on social networks and dating apps offering promising large returns in the crypto markets.
Such investment offers are “likely a scam,” according to the police. The most common forms of scams are investment scams that demand funds upfront.
Staff Sgt. Graeme Smiley informed,
“For those who have fallen victim to a cryptocurrency fraud, we now have the Blockchain Investigative Team who are dedicated to investigating these types of scams.”
John Zabiuk of the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology said crypto scammers are difficult to track down. He claimed scammers rarely operate in the same country as their victims, preferring to operate in regions where law enforcement is weak.
This leads to very little co-operation between law enforcement agencies between the two countries.
35% of Canadians had fallen victim to scams
In June 2023, Toronto Metropolitan University’s Dais think tank published the findings of a survey. It conducted a survey of a total of 2,000 Canadians.
As per the survey, one-third (35%, to be precise) of crypto asset owners in Canada had fallen victim to scams. 49% of the respondents reported “low trust” in crypto exchanges.
It is important to note that Dais collected these survey responses before late 2022 when FTX [FTT] had not collapsed.
