Americans lost $ 185 million on crypto-romantic scams in just 3 months: Report

People lost crypto worth over $ 185 million in the United States through romance fraud in the first quarter of this year, as fraudsters use new means to rob their victims, with romance fraud as prominent.

Nearly 46,000 Americans reported having lost over $ 1 billion in crypto to fraud since early 2021, according to a recent report by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

According to an analysis by BanklessTimes, romance fraud is the second most common type of crypto fraud.

“Victims of romance scams learn that the heart is not so hard the hard way. Their search for love makes them easy to choose to cheat them out of their money,” said Jonathan Merry, CEO of BanklessTimes.

On average, victims of romantic crypto fraud lose around $ 10,000.

After hooking up with the victim, the scammers will “give advice” on how to invest in crypto.

“Now the victims are so trusting that they are willing to follow their” advice “to their detriment, the report said.

Business and government fraud are the other forms. These accounted for a loss of 133 million dollars in the first quarter of 2022. These mean that the scammer pretends to pretend to be someone with authority and then get the victim’s credentials.

Younger people are more prone to crypto fraud. Statistics show that the most likely victims are between the ages of 20 and 40.

“The worst affected are people in their thirties, who suffer 35 percent of the losses. People in their 70s lose almost $ 12,000 on these scams,” said Elizabeth Kerr, a financial content specialist.

But romance scams are not the only ones Americans fall for.

The most common type of crypto fraud is investment fraud, and since 2021 the US FTC has received complaints of losses totaling $ 575 million due to this type of fraud.

–IANS

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(Only the headline and image of this report may have been reworked by Business Standard employees; the rest of the content is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)

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