фото показано с : invezz.com

The cryptocurrency industry is no stranger to scams and fraud, unfortunately, as bad actors were a part of it ever since Bitcoin (BTC/USD) first got its value. With that said, there has been a new trend among the scammers who are using stolen photos to make fake Instagram accounts and scam people by pushing fraudulent crypto schemes.

A self-proclaimed crypto-evangelist by the name of Jason Sallman recently had a first-hand experience with this, after looking up his name on the popular social network, only to find dozens of fake accounts using his name to push crypto scams.

According to Sallman, he has been a crypto enthusiast for a long time, and many of his Instagram photos include Bitcoin. However, if anyone were to search his name on the platform, they would quickly find many other accounts that use his photo, as well as his name. Sometimes, the accounts are using some variation of his name.

Sallman’s own estimate says that there have been more than 500 accounts posing as him over the past several years. At one point, he saw as many as 25 of them at once. Seeking out these accounts and reporting them to Instagram ended up being a full-time job for him.

He said that there is a little function inside of Instagram where one can report an account. Sometimes, the platform responds within a few hours, while sometimes it might take days. There were also instances where it did not respond at all, and so these imposters ended up getting a free pass, despite stealing Sallman’s photos and identity.

The crypto enthusiast also complained that the imposters sometimes make up their own captions for the photos that they stole from him, even those that include his family. The worst part, however, is that they are using these accounts to engage with other Instagram users, pretending to be him, and actively attempting to deceive them and push bogus crypto-investment schemes.

It often happens that the victims of the fake accounts end up tracking his real account down in order to demand their money back. He even received death threats for something that he did not even do.

This is not an isolated incident, either, as many others have experienced the same problem. Unfortunately, for the time being, there doesn’t seem to be any solution to this problem, and the best that anyone can do is try to be as careful as possible when engaging online, especially if it involves unusual crypto offers.

The post A fake Instagram account caught conducting crypto fraud appeared first on Invezz.

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