European cops arrested 15 suspected scammers and shut down a multi-country network of call centers selling fake cryptocurrency that law enforcement said stole upwards of hundreds of million euros from victims.
The scammers tricked their victims into investing large sums of money into fake cryptocurrency schemes according to Europol, which became involved in the investigation in June 2022 at the behest of German law enforcement agencies. The criminals advertised these phony investment opportunities on social media, luring the victims to websites that were controlled by the miscreants that promised too-good-to-be-true crypto investment opportunities. The crooks first convinced the victims to invest low, three-digit sums. Then, using the lure of fake price hikes and lucrative profits, the criminals enticed their victims to transfer larger amounts. Most of the victims were from Germany, and the scammers bilked these individuals alone out of more than €2 million ($2.2 million), according to the police. However, others in Switzerland, Australia and Canada also lost money in the scam. "The investigation suggests that the number of unreported cases is likely to be much higher," Europol
warned. "This would mean that the illegal gains generated by the criminal groups, with at least four call centers in eastern Europe, may be in the hundreds of millions of euros."
In addition to arresting 14 suspects in Serbia and one in Germany, law enforcement questioned 261 individuals in Bulgaria, Cyprus, German and Serbia, some of whom are awaiting prosecution. The police across the four countries searched 22 locations including the four call centers, 11 homes in Serbia and two in Cyprus, as well as two companies and three residences in Bulgaria.
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