Investigative reporter Brian Krebs reported right now that U.S. state and federal investigators are being inundated with experiences from individuals who’ve misplaced tons of of 1000’s or tens of millions of {dollars} in reference to a fancy funding rip-off generally known as “pig butchering,” whereby persons are lured by flirtatious strangers on-line into investing in cryptocurrency buying and selling platforms that finally seize any funds when victims attempt to money out.
The time period “pig butchering” refers to a time-tested, closely scripted, and human-intensive means of utilizing pretend profiles on courting apps and social media to lure individuals into investing in elaborate scams. In a extra visceral sense, pig butchering means fattening up a prey earlier than the slaughter.
“The fraud is known as for the way in which scammers feed their victims with guarantees of romance and riches earlier than slicing them off and taking all their cash,” the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) warned in April 2022. “It’s run by a fraud ring of cryptocurrency scammers who mine courting apps and different social media for victims and the rip-off is turning into alarmingly fashionable.”
Right here is the shocker although…
As documented in a sequence of investigative experiences printed over the previous yr throughout Asia, the individuals creating these phony profiles are largely women and men from China and neighboring nations who’ve been kidnapped and trafficked to locations like Cambodia, the place they’re pressured to rip-off full strangers over the Web — day after day.
Unbelievable. Learn the total story about any such cyber slavery the place social engineering is used from begin to end at Krebs.
