20Young people, minorities among those reporting the biggest losses
The promise of hefty returns is what initially drew Jeffrey Vaulx, a second-grade special ed teacher in Memphis, Tennessee to go in on a cryptocurrency investment opportunity introduced to him by a Facebook friend.
Vaulx would soon discover that he had been taken by a scheme that data from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) shows is part of a billion-dollar industry in the United States.
Vaulx set up an account on a website that he says, “looked legitimate.” He then transferred $500 cash to his friend, who was supposed to purchase the cryptocurrency – a form of unregulated digital money where transactions are verified through digital ledgers. His investment quickly grew to $8000, though to access that newfound wealth Vaulx learned that he would have to pay an additional fee of $500.
That’s when he says the red flags began to appear. “I went back to my friend’s website and saw it was all a hoax,” he recalled. “Fraud was in the back of my head.”
Vaulx was among a panel of speakers during a September 9 media briefing organized by Ethnic Media Services and the FTC.
Experts at the FTC stress that most cryptocurrency scams start with an unsolicited message, either through text, email, or social media. “Social media and crypto is a very combustible combination,” said Cristina Miranda, consumer education specialist at the FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection.
“Just know that a lot of…
