Monday, July 19, 2021

Dipping Into the Cryptocurrency Scam Well Again

Since I've been writing about right-wing affinity scams and cryptocurrency grifts, I figured I'd mention yet another cryptocurrency scam that I recently found about.  Matt Binder, on his Doomed podcast, discussed a cryptocurrency 'pump and dump' scam run by professional gamers and 'influencers'.  Given the youth of their typical audience member, this scam is particularly grotesque.  For those with an hour and a half, the podcast is well worth a listen, if only for the revelation that such a cryptocurrency as MILF Token exists.

For those unfamiliar with how cryptocurrency works, this primer is a good place to start, though the bewildering array of shitcoins is beyond the scope of the video.  For a  quick overview of the current 'influencer' cryptocurrency scam, this video is the place to start, though it might put you in a stabby mood:


 

 In one especially egregious case, one asshole joked that the MILF Token cryptocurrency was trash three weeks after plugging it. 

In a follow-up to the embedded video I posted, commentor Coffeezilla noted that one of the influencers plugging a QAnon-friendly 'Save the Children' cryptocurrency held 6.2 million tokens. While the value of these assets is in fractions of cents, at that scale, even a minor pump-and-dump scam becomes profitable:

  

Cryptocurrencies are a disaster from an environmental standpoint, and a disaster from a regulatory standpoint. The 'meme' altcoins in particular are Dunning-Krugerrands. The fact that web-celebrities are pushing get-rich-quick crypto-scams (well, THEY get rich quick because they get their crypto-coins early on and pump up their value) on young people, who already face a tough job market, and a world chock-full of predatory lenders, is monstrous.

1 comment:

  1. I know somebody who does this. Beware! He is smart and good with math. He is Czech (sorry my friends) and uses his accent to beguile and rip people off. He is always on show with his tricks. Is he a criminal, or a mere charlatan?
    This sounds exactly like something that guy would do.
    I lock my door, but i don't want to call the cops.

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