46,000+ people have reported losing $1B+ cumulatively to crypto scams from January 2021 through March 2022, 24% of dollar losses in fraud reported to the FTC
From Super Bowl ads to Bitcoin ATMs, cryptocurrency seems to be everywhere lately. Although it's yet to become a mainstream payment method …
Federal Trade CommissionEmma Fletcher
Context & Ripple Effects
The FTC’s tally extends an earlier warning that consumers had lost nearly $82 million to crypto scams in late 2020 and early 2021, showing that crypto fraud had become a material share of reported fraud losses rather than a fringe category.
Later reporting charts the persistence of that exposure: crypto-linked investment fraud reached $2.57 billion in 2022 and then $5.6 billion in crypto-related losses in 2023. The FTC’s snapshot is an early marker of that escalation.
First-order effects
Consumers reporting crypto scams account for an outsized share of the FTC’s reported fraud-dollar losses, giving the agency a clearer basis to emphasize crypto-specific consumer warnings.
Crypto promoters and platforms operating amid mass-market visibility face a more pronounced legitimacy problem as reported losses become central to the public record.
The scale of reported losses raises the stakes for the payment and conversion points used in scams, including crypto ATMs, which were later linked to more than $120 million in reported 2023 losses.
Third-order effects
If the loss pattern persists, crypto’s consumer-facing adoption will be judged increasingly through the gap between mainstream marketing and fraud safeguards, not solely through payment or investment utility.
Fraud reporting is becoming a shared enforcement lens for the FTC and FBI, with investment scams accounting for most crypto-related losses in the later FBI data.
The trend: Crypto’s expansion into consumer channels is being accompanied by a widening legitimacy gap as investment scams and the mechanisms used to fund them absorb a growing share of reported fraud losses.
FTC reports $329 million lost to crypto scams in Q1 2022 June 3, 2022 https://web3isgoinggreat.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
@linakhanftc
Lina Khan on x
New @FTC analysis shows that cryptocurrency scams are proliferating, with about 1 out of every 4 dollars reported lost to fraud paid in cryptocurrency. Since the start of 2021, consumers have reported losing over $1 billion in crypto to scams. https://www.ftc.gov/...
@fchollet
François Chollet on x
@levie 35% of all fraud (by $ amount?) is an incredible number. Crypto has truly found its product-market fit and disrupted the only scam space.
@victor12865
Victor Fawole on x
Social media play a key role in facilitating scams. The FTC report says that roughly half of the people who lost crypto to scammers since the beginning of 2021 were using apps like Instagram, Facebook and Telegram.
@videobun
@videobun on x
everyone makes fun of grandparents for falling for credit card phone scams and shit but THIS is like, targeted hit gullible young people. phone and email scams filter for people with no sense of security, funny money filters for people easily reassured by *fake* security. https:/…
@web3isgreat
@web3isgreat on x
“Since the start of 2021, more than 46,000 people have reported losing over $1 billion in crypto to scams - that's about one out of every four dollars reported lost”
@victor12865
Victor Fawole on x
Bad actors managed to cash in 60 times more in 2021 than in 2018, which underscores the growing scope of cryptocurrency scams. You should be smart with your crypto investment as scam increases. #crypto #cryptoscam #scammers #cryptocurrency #bitcoinscam https://twitter.com/...
The most common type of crypto fraud was investment scams, followed by romance scams. Third place was business imposters, then government imposters.
@web3isgreat
@web3isgreat on x
The report is worth reading in full, but I'll thread some of the details below. https://www.ftc.gov/...
@paulblu
Paul Blumenthal on x
“Since the start of 2021, more than 46,000 people have reported losing over $1 billion in crypto to scams - that's about one out of every four dollars reported lost, more than any other payment method.” https://www.ftc.gov/...
@dangillmor
Dan Gillmor on x
Sounds like an underestimate... https://twitter.com/...
@yoda
@yoda on x
ngmi https://twitter.com/...
@tonyajoriley
Tonya Riley on x
The number is a steep climb from the $80 million in losses the FTC reported last year for a six-month period between October 2020 and March 2021. tip @Techmeme https://www.cyberscoop.com/...
@jeffdanherrera
@jeffdanherrera on x
Incredible. What an above-board new financial market. Really innovative. https://twitter.com/...
@edroso
Roy Edroso on x
Actually “losses to cryptocurrency scams” is pretty much a synonym for the cryptocurrency market https://twitter.com/...
@josephmiller3
@josephmiller3 on x
Not great! https://twitter.com/...
@mattbruenig
Matt Bruenig on x
25% of all fraud losses reported to the FTC involved crypto payments https://twitter.com/...
@daviduberti
David Uberti on x
The FTC says reported crypto scams topped $1 billion since last year, in part due to the work of “keyboard Casanovas” https://www.ftc.gov/... https://twitter.com/...
@silvermanjacob
Jacob Silverman on x
Dude just DYOR and you'll be fine. https://twitter.com/...
@tonyromm
Tony Romm on x
this is utterly bonkers https://twitter.com/...
@ftc
@ftc on x
FTC's latest Consumer Protection Data Spotlight shows that most of the #cryptocurrency losses consumers reported involved bogus cryptocurrency investment opportunities, which totaled $575 million in reported losses since January 2021: https://www.ftc.gov/... #DataSpotlight /3