The development of Blockchain technology in general and cryptocurrencies in particular is opening a new era for the development of the global economic industry, but along with it is the increase of high-tech crime with Very sophisticated scams.
Recently, Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA for short) has started an investigation after receiving numerous complaints from investors in a scam users sent money from Binance wallet to Binance. Unknown wallet address.
Hamza Khan, the representative of Binance in Pakistan, has been asked by the FIA to provide relevant information to determine the role of Binance exchange with these online scam applications, according to local sources.
According to the announcement from the FIA, victims are required to register an account on Binance and then transfer money to a 3rd party wallet address with an extremely attractive profit commitment:
“This is a Ponzi scheme where you pay someone else’s money and disappear as soon as they make billions of Rupees.”
After an investigation, the FIA has now identified 11 apps involved in this scam: TASKTOK, BB001, BX66, MXC, FXCOPY, AVG86C, HTFOX, OKIMINI, 91fc, UG, and HFC. These applications all stop working suddenly without notifying the user in any way.
In addition to requiring users to register on Binance and transfer funds to third parties, victims were also allowed to join a Telegram group to be “provided with trading signals.” It is known that each of the above applications has a user base of more than 5,000 people.
“Binance Holdings Limited has been requested to provide information regarding 26 related wallet addresses as well as to block transactions of these addresses,” the notice added.
In addition, the FIA also blocked the bank accounts suspected of this scam and did not forget to send a warning to the Binance representative.
“We will propose financial penalties to Binance through State Bank of Pakistan in case Binance fails to comply.”
According to a report by Chainalysis in 2021, Pakistan is ranked third in the world in terms of crypto adoption, just behind Vietnam and India. In addition, Nasir Hayat Magoon – President of Pakistan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) said that Pakistani citizens hold up to $20 billion in cryptocurrencies.