Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has taken legal action against two individuals based in China for allegedly using its platforms to promote fraudulent cryptocurrency apps. These apps, hosted on Google Play and advertised on YouTube, amassed over 100,000 downloads.
Alphabet claims that the defendants engaged in racketeering by committing hundreds of acts of wire fraud through the scam apps. The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in New York on April 4, alleges that the scammers deceived users into depositing funds into fake cryptocurrency investments, which they could not withdraw.
Despite Google‘s efforts to remove fraudulent apps, the scammers managed to bypass detection systems and continue uploading racketeering apps since 2019.
Halimah DeLaine Prado, Google’s general counsel, emphasized the importance of the lawsuit in holding bad actors accountable and protecting platform users from exploitation.
According to Scam Sniffer, phishing scams targeting cryptocurrencies saw a 50% increase in March, resulting in approximately $71 million in losses across all chains. In the first quarter of 2024, phishing scams accounted for $173 million in losses, with the majority involving ERC-20 tokens on the Ethereum network.
Phishing scams involve social engineering tactics to deceive victims into sharing sensitive information or installing malicious software voluntarily.
Hacks and exploits pose significant challenges to the crypto industry, particularly decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. In 2023, losses from crypto hacks and scams amounted to $1.8 billion, with a notable portion attributed to the North Korean Lazarus Group.
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