The FBI's Internet Crime Report 2022 released this week revealed a scary jump in crypto related scams. Crypto investment scams have more than doubled, stats from 2021 reported  $907 million stolen from investors while in 2022 this number jumped to $2.57 billion. The FBI's Internet Crime Report for 2022 is showing that crypto-focused investment scams accounted for more than 77% of total investment scams reported to its Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3). These are worrying numbers which shows the lack of caution and alertness amongst investors to such gimmicks.

While the most popular crypto scams include upgrade scams, investment scams, simswap scams, liquidity mining scams, phishing scams, Fake Crypto Exchanges and Crypto Wallets, the FBI report revealed that there are 31 000  cases of investment scams that were reported with the most susceptible victims being in the ages 30 to 49. FBI  notes that reports of ransomware attacks have decreased, but credits that this might not necessarily mean a decrease of the crime but could also indicate that fewer people reported to them. This is especially  true if we consider that the FBI's Internet Crime Report  for 2022 reports $2.57 billion lost to scams while the blockchain intelligence firm Chainalysis report for 2022 scam related loss reports a much higher number, $5.9 billion. All these numbers differ and are subject to the info reported to them. The number could be much higher if we take into account those who did not report.

These are worrying numbers which shows the lack of caution and alertness amongst investors to such gimmicks. This reveals an urgency to increase awareness about crypto scams as the number is becoming alarmingly high. We hope note but, if you ever find yourself a victim of crypto scams you can report to these places:

Federal Trade Commission

Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)

Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3)