Kirsty Mckenzie
SPANISH courts are overwhelmed with the number of cases related to the fake cryptocurrency schemes.
Following the recent price increase of cryptocurrencies, con artists have been taking advantage and thousands of people in Spain have fallen victim to the scam.
Reports of scams relating to cryptocurrency investments rose 57 per cent to 5,581 in the 12 months to December 2020, according to new data from Action Fraud.
A Spaniard is accused of being behind a business called Algorithms Group, which allegededly swindled over 300 investors out of €280 million.
Javier Biosca, who has been acting as a broker buying and selling cryptocurrencies and offering weekly interests of 25 per cent investment, then vanished with the money.
The lawyer representing private investors, Emilia Zaballos, has claimed the scam could have affected 4,000 people.
Zaballos said “Among those affected are people of all kinds. From notaries, lawyers, national police, businessmen, to tax inspectors and even judges. But also domestic workers, retirees, and the unemployed.”
Zaballos is now urging for the establishment of new courts for cryptocurrency crimes and an increase in guidance from established institutes on the matter.
It comes as UK presenter Holly Willoughby was reportedly upset that her face has been used to promote a scam with fake quotes being attributed to her.
Two bogus websites used imaged of the This Morning host and misquoted her, implying that she invested in the scheme.
One of the fake quotes used, which is attributed to Holly reads: “I’ve heard about many bitcoin success stories over the past few years but it was always too complicated for me to understand.”
In the advert, it falsely claims that Holly invested £250 and made a £60 profit on that amount.
There have been a spate of online scams using fake celebrity endorsement to sell persuade punters to invest in the dodge schemes.
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