Cryptocurrency scammers force victims to record videos to attract new victims

[CarderPlanet]

The Vice Motherboard reports on a massive wave of attacks in which Instagram users are forced to urge their followers to take part in a scam. For the first time, the publication reported about such a fraud last week: then the criminal blackmailed the victim to make a video in which she promised subscribers that they would return and increase their funds if they sent bitcoins to the attacker. Moreover, after recording the video, the attacker still hacked the victim's Instagram account, sent the video to her friends and tried to deceive other users.

After the publication of this story, other Instagram users contacted the journalists, claiming that they, too, were hacked and forced to shoot similar videos.

"Hi guys! I just got back after a long day at work, but Ashley helped me invest $ 1,000 and gave me $ 8,500 back in three hours," says Emma Zoller on camera, who was forced to shoot one of these videos. - What a great way to end the day! I feel so happy and so grateful. Everything is guaranteed. I suggest [you] do the same.
I can't believe it, but bitcoin mining is real <...>, you should all try, you should invest in bitcoin mining, it is [100%] safe and reliable."

Of course, Ashley mentioned in the video is a fraud. This scam began with the fact that Zoller saw a message from her alleged best friend in her story about making money with bitcoins. Zoller followed the link sent from her friend's account (the phishing page mimicked a real Instagram page), and the hacker took over her account.

Initially, the attacker demanded that Zoller send an explicit video to restore access to the account. When the girl flatly refused, the attacker told her to shoot a video advertising cryptocurrency fraud. When his demand was met, the hacker did not return the victim's account, but instead posted a video of Zoller in the story.

The hacker also managed to hack the victim's Venmo, email and banking applications, send himself a $ 500 payment to Venmo, marked as "Investment Fee", and buy $ 1,000 worth of bitcoins with her funds. Journalists say that the editorial office has all the screenshots confirming this.

Another victim of such a fraudulent scheme is Tim Nugent, who also provided the Vice Motherboard with a video that he was forced to film by order of the hackers.

“I just made a couple of big purchases because I invested through Star. You get your money quickly. It's all very simple, ”he said on camera.

“I thought I was talking to a friend all this time and investing in [cryptocurrency] with him,” Nugent explained to reporters. “When I realized it was a scam, they already had access to my business account with more than 13,000 followers I make for a living.”

The victim used his Instagram account to promote his Tapes from the Crypt business, which sells horror items through Etsy. Now Nugent complains that the scammer has already compromised two of his clients and subscribers, people do not understand what is happening, and his reputation is practically destroyed.

After the Vice Motherboard was published, other journalists also discovered similar cases of fraud. For example, Substack The Red Tape Chronicles spoke with a victim who was also forced to make a similar video. The victim first paid $ 1,000 to an old friend who allegedly needed money for a kidney transplant, and then the hackers stole almost $ 3,000 from her.

The developers of Instagram told reporters that they recommend that account owners use strong passwords (combinations of letters and special characters, at least six characters long), and also include two-factor authentication.

The company also advises users not to reuse the same ones. This is probably how the hacker managed to switch from one account to another: the victim entered his Instagram password on a phishing page, and the same password was suitable for her email. This allowed the fraudster to gain access to the mailbox, and then reset passwords to many other services.