More than half a million dollars in crypto assetsthat was the figure for which four young people from Rosario were charged for alleged scams generated through an online game similar to the one known Pokemon.
The defendants were identified as Manuel Angel B.; Gianluca P; Ramiro S. and Gianfranco S.and if well they were released After having been detained for six days, they must comply with a series of rules of conduct such as the prohibition to leave the country and the setting of a real security of assets, the judge ruled Nicholas Foppiani.
Mariano Riosthe prosecutor in charge of the investigation, accused the four young people of having kept $2.6 million from the liquidity pool of an online game called beastmasterby sending money invested by players to their personal virtual wallets.
As explained by the prosecutor, the defendants created this online game that is similar in its dynamics to the Pokémon game, in which players had to buy “beasts” and could invest in a “gym” and make the characters evolve.
Among other things, “they generated a banner for the pre-sale of the ‘beasts’ that would be necessary to play”, while “to train and improve the characters they sold Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)”, reported the Public Prosecutor’s Office (MPA).
NFTs are unique digital assets that are encrypted and represent something unique, while not being identically interchangeable, the Prosecutor’s Office explained. “This differentiates them from cryptocurrencies, but in essence they are two versions of the same technology,” Ríos said.
The dynamics of the game allowed acquiring gyms and training the characters, which generated value for the players. “These could buy and sell their ‘beasts’, and in the game mode they presented in the tactic, these ‘beasts’ could be improved by users, also adding economic value,” the prosecution said.
In this way, in addition to the playful aspect, the player generated an investment “to later sell it and obtain a profit” in cryptocurrency.
On December 7, 2021, the creators emptied all the funds from the liquidity pool, which reached US$ 2,610,312, “transferring to 15 accounts” of virtual wallets. After this fact, the platform Binance released the identities of the game holders, so they decided to return part of the money. “However, by withdrawing all the funds and removing all the information about the game, they caused the value of the token (the coin) to drop to zero and the money invested in them was never returned”stated prosecutor Ríos, who estimated that possible $600,000 scam.
Manuel Angel B.; Gianluca P; Ramiro S. and Gianfranco S. were detained since last Thursday after a series of raids carried out in Rosario and other nearby cities in which firearms and electronic elements were also kidnapped, until this Tuesday when the imputed hearing was held.
Justice had been following this activity since last year when the situation arose from a case based in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires (CABA), sources in the case said.
According to BTR Consulting, the crypto world has been quite fertile ground for all kinds of scams, since a lot of education is needed on various topics. In this sense, he stated that the possibility of profiting at the expense of users is quite large.
It should be noted that although cryptocurrencies are mostly used legally, they have also become attractive treasure troves for criminals, who are quite creative when it comes to setting all kinds of traps for unsuspecting owners. In this sense, the consultant distinguished different types of scams used in the crypto world.
– Cloned sites: scammers prepare a website identical to the legitimate one, which can be from an exchange house or online wallet to the official page of an Initial Coin Offering (ICO), and propagate it through different means, including email , chats and even Google ads that can be confused with the original page in the search results.
– Fake support teams: scammers sometimes skip the step of creating the fake site and simply pose as the support team of some legitimate platform, including exchanges and wallets. “In this way, the only thing they imitate are the logos and the email address of the company within the message they send to their victims to announce any alleged inconvenience and request their private information with the false purpose of helping them,” the firm explained. .
– Gifts in social networks: it is quite similar to the phishing, since it is about using impostor accounts on the networks to deceive users. According to the consulting firm specialized in fraud prevention analysis, the difference is that funds are requested directly through these accounts instead of just confidential information, under the promise that a much higher reward will be received after transfer. a rather small percentage in comparison.
With information from Telam Agency.
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