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From Ads to Atrocity: How Investment Scams Scale Online, A Conversation with Jim Browning, Scam Investigator and YouTuber
200 Plays4 days ago
Investment scams are no longer clumsy or obvious. They’re professional, polished, and engineered to look legitimate. In this episode of Scam Rangers, we’re joined again by Jim Browning, renowned scam investigator and YouTuber, to unpack how modern investment scams scale online, why even smart and cautious people fall victim, and how platforms, ads, and recovery scams fuel a devastating cycle of harm.
Drawing from firsthand investigations, undercover work, and real victim stories, Jim reveals how today’s scams operate as full-blown business models, from lead generation through online ads, to fake investment platforms, to secondary “recovery” scams that exploit victims all over again.
This conversation goes beyond tactics to expose the systemic failures enabling scams at scale — and what it will actually take to slow them down.
What We Cover in This Episode
- How online ads have become the primary on-ramp for investment scams
- Why modern investment scams are designed to look realistic, not “too good to be true”
- The hidden ecosystem behind scam ads, lead sellers, and scam operators
- How fake investment platforms manipulate trust, timing, and withdrawal rules
- Why victims are often allowed to withdraw small amounts — until they can’t
- The rise of recovery scams and why they’re often more cruel than the original fraud
- How scammers exploit crypto wallets, remote access tools, and psychological pressure
- Why attribution, enforcement, and cross-border accountability remain so difficult
- What Jim is seeing change — and where there’s real reason for cautious optimism
Key Takeaways
- Scams don’t look like scams anymore — they look like regulated products, advisors, and platforms
- Online advertising is a force multiplier, dramatically lowering the cost of victim acquisition
- Recovery scams are a second wave of victimization, targeting people at their most desperate moment
- Technology alone won’t fix this — coordination across platforms, banks, regulators, and law enforcement is essential
- Awareness helps, but intervention earlier in the scam lifecycle is critical to preventing irreversible harm
About the Guest
Jim Browning is a scam investigator and one of the most recognized voices in exposing online fraud. Through technical expertise and investigative work, he infiltrates scam operations, reveals how they function, and works to disrupt their impact. His work has helped raise global awareness of how modern scams operate , and why they continue to succeed.
Follow Jim on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@JimBrowning
About the Host
This podcast is hosted by Ayelet Biger-Levin, who spent the last 15 years building technology to help financial institutions authenticate their customers and identify fraud. She believes that when it comes to scams, the story starts well before the transaction. She has created this podcast to talk about the human side of scams, and to learn from people who have decided to dedicate their lives to speaking up on behalf of scam victims and who take action to solve this problem.
Be sure to follow her on LinkedIn and reach out to learn about her additional activities in this space:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ayelet-biger-levin/
ScamRanger:
https://scamranger.ai/
Recommended
Transcript
Meta's Role in Enabling Scams
00:00:01
Speaker
you know what the largest crime syndicate in the world is? And the answer is it's the Sinaloa drugs cartel, who they take in about 30 billion a year. It's an estimate. But number two if you have any idea who that is, the answer is Meta, because they enable scams on their platforms. Although we had a representative from Meta there to kind of talk about the Bouders article, which kind of exposed a lot of this. He had a very, let's just say, set answer. And some of what he was saying didn't really make sense because we can see what goes on. and
00:00:36
Speaker
But even if it's only a fraction of what came out of that, it is ridiculous that that company are earning money directly through the sale of adverts, which they know are scams. And that honestly, there's no excuse for that. and Any company who's making that amount of revenue when they know it's a scam,
00:00:55
Speaker
You know, they need to be called out for what they are. They're enabling crime. So they're a crime syndicate.
00:01:03
Speaker
When a scam expert like Jim Browning says that out loud, it stops you in your tracks. Because this episode isn't about falling for scams. It's about how professional, global and industrialized fraud has become and how ordinary people are being pulled in through systems they
Jim Browning: Inside the World of Scams
00:01:19
Speaker
trust. In this conversation, Jim takes us inside the real ecosystem behind today's investment scams, how fake ads lead to fake platforms, how early withdrawals are used to build trust, and how victims are targeted again and again by recovery scammers once the damage is done. These aren't careless mistakes. These are smart, cautious people doing their homework and still losing their life savings, their homes, and their sense of safety.
00:01:44
Speaker
If you work in banking, tech, regulation, or fraud prevention, this episode is a wake-up call. And if you're a consumer, it's a warning you can't afford to ignore.
00:01:56
Speaker
Welcome to Scam Rangers, a podcast about the human side of fraud and the people who are on a mission to protect us. I'm your host, Ayelet Bigger Levine, and I'm passionate about driving awareness and solving this problem.
00:02:16
Speaker
So I am so excited to have today's Scam Ranger on the podcast, actually a returning visitor or returning guest. I wanted to welcome Jim Browning. Jim Browning is a YouTuber, i would say a scam investigator, really, who infiltrates comments. call centers and actually was able to help in or even initiate a takedown of a scam call center in Dubai and was a guest on the podcast. So if you haven't heard the previous episode, ah definitely go check it out. And today we have many more things to learn about from Jim. So welcome to the podcast, Jim. So great to have you here again. Well, thanks for the invites. Second time around. Hopefully, hopefully I'll be able to give you a little bit more insights into a few other things that I've been looking at. But lovely to be here Thanks for inviting me. Maybe you can start by sharing who you are, what you do, and then briefly and then we'll get into, you know, attempts to stop scammers.
00:03:14
Speaker
Yeah, well, OK, my background is am an ordinary guy who works in IT. I really am. These days, people know me for my pseudonym. So Jim Browning isn't even my real name. It is my YouTube name. It's my handle on YouTube. What I do is expose scams and scammers. In the most direct way you can possibly imagine, I am able to hack into their computers and turn on their CCTV and webcams and confront them live on air, if you like. And not only do I do that, but I try to... dig deep into the scams and find out how they work. See who's responsible. Unpick the various parts of the scam. Find out who the bosses are, how much they make. Have a look at who's in the room, where is this call centre and publish all of that on YouTube. So I suppose scams and scammers It was always a hobby for me doing that sort of thing. So up until just a couple of years ago, I had, if you like, a real job. I wasn't an official YouTuber. But these days I find that the videos are so popular that um I've made it become my job. So my hobby has become my job and I like taking out scammers. um And it's a nice way of hearing about scams, because I think through the the YouTube channel, knowing the details of how these scams work kind of forearms you.
00:04:38
Speaker
And if you encounter a scam like this, then if you've seen all of my videos, maybe you'll be on your guard against it. So that's my background. Got into it accidentally. But here I am. Yeah. And just to say that if you want to check out the channel, the handle is Jim Browning. you can just search on YouTube, Jim Browning.
00:04:56
Speaker
Jim, you have 4.42 million subscribers today um and growing. So thank you for for doing that. Over quite number of years. But yeah, if you look for me on, just look for that name, you'll find me.
Global Anti-Scam Efforts
00:05:09
Speaker
So you and I had recently we've seen each other at the Global Anti-Scam Summit in Washington, D.C. a few weeks ago and December of 2025. And we had the ability to connect and chat a little bit. I really love the session that you did with ah a few other scambaiters.
00:05:28
Speaker
It was Gambitish Unplugged, it was, yeah. And there was four of us on stage, Paul Raphael, who I know you know, because after sextortionists, if you ever get a chance to look up Paul Raphael, look at his work because he does amazing stuff trying to um really bring sextortion to the world.
00:05:47
Speaker
really to the world and see what goes on there. But yes, it was Paul, Kitboga, Rosie and the myself on stage. And it was Scambators Unplugged, which meant that we weren't really going to talk through presentations or slides. We had a couple of slides, but it was just kind of us asking each other questions and allowing the people who were there to ask a few questions. So yeah, it was nice. It was kind of ah a free flow chat And let's just say we could cover, I guess, more things and maybe some of the pre-prepared slides that were there I saw from other people. And yeah, we we kind of started off in the same sort of way that the conference started, where we started with a victim story.
00:06:26
Speaker
And um because we had Metta in the room with us, it was an opportunity to say, hey, you guys can do a bit better. But it had to be tempered a little bit with the fact that Meta are one of GAS's sponsors. So in some ways you can't go too overboard. and I would have liked to have said a few more things than I did, but I had to hold back quite deliberately. But ah I say this all the time. If you're in meta or have, you know, association with Facebook or Snapchat or Instagram, there's a lot more that can be done to combat scams there. OK, so I'm going to interject here So i I personally don't think you should have held back. But if you didn't have to hold back, what would you say?
00:07:10
Speaker
I had prepared a few lines to say that I was going to ask the audience, do you know what the largest crime syndicate in the world is? And the answer is it's the Sinaloa drugs cartel, who they take in about 30 billion a year. It's an estimate. due to scams and fraud and drug selling and all the rest of it.
00:07:30
Speaker
But number two if you have any idea who that is, the answer is Meta because they enable scams on their platforms. Although we had a representative from Meta there to kind of talk about the Bouders article, which kind of exposed a lot of this. he had a very, let's just say, set answer. And some of what he was saying didn't really make sense because we can see what goes on.
00:07:54
Speaker
And although there aren't firm figures, and I don't think that are actually confirming a lot of the figures that came out in that Rouse article, but even if it's only a fraction of what came out of that, it is still ridiculous that that company are earning money directly through the seal of adverts, which they know are scams. And that is Honestly, there's no excuse for that. and Any company who's making that amount of revenue when they know it's a scam, you know, they need to be called out for what they are. They're enabling crime. So they're a crime syndicate. And that's what I was tempted to say. But held back a little bit because it's not my forum.
00:08:33
Speaker
ah I can speak a little bit more openly here. Yeah. Actually, after the conference, another article came out from Reuters talking about a team that was that have identified the scam ads and it had actually successfully taken down 50 percent or slashed the number by 50 percent. But then it also impacted revenue. So they were asked to stop. Yes. And that right there is what is extremely alarming. And we'll see how um how things unfold there. But I think that that last article definitely caught the attention of lawmakers, regulators. So I'm definitely looking forward to see how things are unfolding there.
00:09:08
Speaker
Yeah, I have my doubt. I mean, if we know that has happened, it's going to happen again. And if Meta and I've heard them say that really there's no regulation, if you like, and that might be true, but if they're waiting for regulation, that is just the wrong thing to do, because you can already see what's happened in Australia, where the government have actually banned social media for teenager under 16s anyway. And I have a horrible feeling that if they don't take action, then this will be the outcome in other countries as well. So they will start losing revenue. So the sooner they can pick up and get serious about it, the better, in my opinion. But we'll see. I will take the opportunity to call out whenever meta misbehaving on my channel,
00:09:55
Speaker
And maybe like scammers, sometimes the only answer to all of this is to embarrass them publicly. So I'll do my bit. Yeah, I know the social media ban in Australia is really interesting because definitely teens are, you know, a primary target for advertisers. And if you ban social media accounts for teens, then you lose a lot of your ad revenue and it's going to potentially be another way.
00:10:17
Speaker
And regulators, it's it's not just teens, but I understand the debate around regulation for free speech. i I definitely understand the debate there. But this is not free speech. These are ads. That's right. Definitely need to do better.
00:10:31
Speaker
I agree. And I'm totally with you on free speech. I think free speech is fundamental and it is human right. And, you know, I think it's fine to when you do, as you say, have an opinion, you can voice it within reason and that should always be protected. But as you say, this this is they know that these are scam ads. They know it because it's part of their data set. And when you know something is a fraud and you refuse to do something about it, that makes you complicit. And I don't understand why they have any excuse for doing what they're doing. um So, yeah, each and every time I see that, I'll be calling it out.
The Sophistication of Investment Scams
00:11:13
Speaker
So one of the things actually, and just shifting gears a little bit, but still staying at the unplugged session. One of the things that I really kind of that caught my attention in that conversation beyond a lot of conversations about methods and and questions and how you feel and and things like that. I think one of the things that really struck me was, have you managed to convince a scammer to stop scamming?
00:11:38
Speaker
Yeah, so almost every time I can, I ask the scammers two questions. And the first one is, why are you doing that? Because I'm still waiting for honest answers. yeah The honest answer will always be because I'm greedy. Money. Yeah. and that that But nevertheless, I still like to ask that question, just see the excuses that they'll give. But whenever I do confront scammers and the bosses of scam call centers in particular, i do keep a careful eye on what happens after it. Now, I will challenge them. I've never yet met a scam boss who's done anything other than deny that they're scamming. So, you know, I will ask them, why are you doing this? And they'll say, hey, I don't even scam.
00:12:19
Speaker
Even though I've got video recordings of them actually running the scam, wandering around the office, get their spreadsheets. I've dug into their PayPal where they've got direct connections between the victims and the money being taken in by the scam organization, submitted that to the police. I have had people arrested as a direct result. um But if you're asking how often does that happen, um the short answer is not often enough because unfortunately, a lot of where these scam call centers are tend not to be in the same country as the victim. So usually when it comes to telephone-based scams, the scam center is typically in India, certainly if it's telephone-based.
00:13:01
Speaker
And more often than not, when I report the scam call center to the local authorities there, usually they just go quiet after that. So, and I don't see any like log of arrests or anything like that. Hmm.
00:13:17
Speaker
It obviously they could have silently arrested the bosses and they're locked up, but I doubt it. Um, the, the couple of occasions where I know that arrests have been made, um, I can demonstrate there that they are for show.
00:13:31
Speaker
And one case in particular, there was a, one of my first ever times that got CCTV, um, on very, very strong evidence. was in a company called Fairmark Travels. Sound like a travel agency. That was their front end. Behind the scenes, though, they were running a a pop-up scam.
00:13:49
Speaker
And I was able to record their activities, got the BBC involved in that. And ultimately, I think because the BBC were involved, arrests were made. Mm-hmm.
00:14:00
Speaker
When I followed the case, and I do have the kind of case notes in all of this, what I saw was the police effectively offered no evidence whatsoever, even though the evidence had been given to the police.
00:14:13
Speaker
And they could have done very, very simple things like contact PayPal to confirm all of this. But the Basically, they did nothing at all. So when the case came to court in India um and the judge was asking for evidence, they didn't present anything. And moreover, the defense was, even though there were videos available showing these guys scamming on CCTV and even the boss walking around the office. um And what what basically they said was, well, that could have been AI.
00:14:42
Speaker
And the judge accepted that. So if you look at the court notes, I don't even say I say i O instead of Now, whether that's a typo or whether like the judge doesn't understand the concept of A, who knows? Either way, no case was made effectively and the guy walked free, even though i could show and prove that he had taken tens of thousands of dollars, was living in the lap of luxury. He just got away with it. So. Yeah, there you go. And unfortunately, that happens in countries where you do get a corrupt um police force.
00:15:16
Speaker
Now, things may have changed since then, of course. Maybe this is a few years ago. Maybe things have changed. But and I know that there are areas and in India where, for example, there were lots and lots of call centers congregated into a small area. I'm talking about Sector 5 and Kolkata or Kolkata.
00:15:33
Speaker
And that was the scam capital of the world for a while. But actually, because I get to see where these scammer computers are these days, you don't find very many in that area anymore. So something's changed. And I think it may be because actually there are raids happening there. So maybe credit where it's due, but not down to anything I've done. Or perhaps there are so many people have uncovered scam call centers. So scam bidders like me are publishing so many of these that they're actually afraid to run large call centers in that area. They're now spread out. Yeah, it's probably the latter.
00:16:08
Speaker
it just it just makes me think, like, we often talk about the fact that much of the scamming happens overseas, and um it's really hard to recover the funds because of that. It's really hard to ah catch and arrest the criminals.
00:16:22
Speaker
i think there's a stat saying less than 0.05% of all scammers are caught um in these situations, and therefore we really need collaboration globally of Police forces, like law enforcement from different countries, but also sanctions and more pressure on governments to take more action. And it's it's really critical when it when there is corruption. And we've seen Cambodia. Definitely. There's no hope there at this point unless something really, really critical happens from a pressure perspective on the government level. Oh, for sure. I mean, Southeast Asia, I was criticizing India there, but you're right, Southeast Asia is another level of corruption. You know, that there's no way, for example, if you've got your scam calls that were set to do it in Myanmar, where a lot of these pig butchering scams happen,
00:17:14
Speaker
Basically, nothing's going to happen because it's a military state and you would literally need an army to go in there, raid buildings and who's got an army? Spare it to raid, make, infiltrate another country. It's just not going to happen. So the scammers are today getting away with it. But maybe, maybe there's some changes of there. I would like to think so.
00:17:33
Speaker
So let's transition into that. So let us know kind of what is happening today, the ecosystem. So I think last time we talked to was around April of 2025. And you've observed some changes happening, some new things. So love to dive into that. Yeah, so, I mean, what I've been doing since then is actually taking on one particular type of scam that I haven't really concentrated certainly on my channel recently, and that is investment scams. And they are fast becoming the top type of scam that you'll see. And all you need to do is look around Facebook. I'm bringing meta into this again. So you will, if you use Facebook at all, um you are almost... bound to see one of these adverts, which is talking about crypto AI investment. They have to throw in a few buzzwords, of course. So AI, quantum, any kind of buzzword you can imagine. If you look for the word investment with a few of those buzzwords, you will invariably find an advert on there where somebody is showing one of those kind of candlestick graphs of this money increasing and You know, sometimes you'll see celebrities supposedly endorsing these and you'll know they're going to be AI and it's usually Elon Musk or someone like that. Recently, my husband showed me he saw a few times the CEO of Robinhood, deepfaker, obviously. And when you click on that ad, let's say, OK, I want to invest. Then you go to this WhatsApp chat with a lovely Asian woman.
00:19:04
Speaker
Immediately. And then we we we did try to click again to see what happens the next time. And it opens a WhatsApp chat with another lovely Asian woman. It just that's the method. It's just distributes the scam to the different scam agents sitting there. Oh yeah. And I get to see that in a bit of detail because if I can, I mean, I've, I've dug into these scams, we'll go into that in a second, but when I do see the computers of the scammers, they operate that you realize there's an ecosystem sitting around that. And the ecosystem is the people who place those ads are not, they're not directly taking the money off victims. Their role is purely to place the ads. They will sell the leads that they get. so when you click on one of those ads, yes, you might get an Asian lady saying, are you interested? Invariably, they will ask you for your name, your phone number, your email.
00:19:56
Speaker
And just to clarify, it's not ah it's not an Asian lady. it's It's a scammer sitting in a scam. complex so We don't really know the identity. Yeah, you know, even sometimes they're not a WhatsApp chat. Sometimes it's simply a web form that asks for those three pieces of information.
00:20:09
Speaker
And I filled in, albeit some fake details onto that sort of form. And I got 14 different, I mentioned this on stage, 14 different phone calls as a result of that.
00:20:21
Speaker
And every one of the people who called me saying, hey, if you get any other calls, they're the scammers and we're the real deal. But they're always saying the same thing. They're always saying, all you need to do is invest $200, $250 into my website and go from there. And if you do that, and I have done this, they will direct you to some website and you always see your money increasing.
00:20:46
Speaker
Now, they may even let you withdraw that small amount of money. but it is purely there to encourage you to put a lot more money in. And sadly, people, because their websites look so professional, and if you do your homework on a lot of them, you will see you know reviews that are all positive.
00:21:06
Speaker
Yeah, you will see that these people are regulated by real financial conduct authorities. And some of them have emails so professional. actually work with the BBC on one of them. And they were doubting themselves whether this was actually going to be a scam or not. So that's the whole thing about it. You can do a load of homework on this, but I guarantee you you will find it incredibly difficult to figure out whether it's really a scam or not. And only I was watching the inside of all of this.
00:21:38
Speaker
I nearly convinced myself that it wasn't a scam, but it was. So I just want to stop there because this is super important. And i have unfortunately talked to, you know, I talk about scams everywhere I go. And I've talked to so many people recently who have engaged with someone or some of my neighbor's grandfather or so many people who are doing this doing receiving these ads or receiving some communications. It was on Facebook, by the way, the the story that I and and doing the research there. They're smart people doing the research, seeing this. It looks credible.
00:22:12
Speaker
And the only tell between you and I, we know this is that the fact that you keep getting and gaining money and invest. That's not a real thing. Right. Yeah. Yeah, it's not even unrealistic minds. i mean, they they were they were canny enough to say, well, you know it's unrealistic. I think your money will double overnight. They were saying, well, maybe again, by about, you know, maybe 10 to 15 percent.
00:22:36
Speaker
OK, so that could be a good investment, but it's better than like bank rates, but you know, pitched in a way that it is realistic. You know, it's not that it is too good to be true. Yes, it's good, but not too good. So that they pitch it just right. And that's, that's the thing about it. And if, if you did your own work,
00:22:56
Speaker
you would see that actually everything that they're saying, you know they're they're versed in the kind of things that a real investor would talk about. um They will look at market trends. they will They actually have little internal groups which show real financial analysis from external groups, and they'll repeat all of this back to their victims. So it's not as if... people are going into this and why on earth could you fall for that sort scam the scammers are professionals they do their homework um there was one group that when i first tried to infiltrate them i had they didn't know if i was genuine or not or how much money i had and i had to sit with them literally for a week listening to their sales pitch and their spiel about investments And almost everything that they said was exactly what you'd expect a real financial advisor to tell you.
00:23:49
Speaker
okay they they If anything, they didn't stress the risks as much as the rewards. Obviously, they're not going to say, hey, you could lose it all, which, you know, if you're talking about crypto investments, should be said. But they kept that. They would say, look, some people have lost money, but if you stay with me, i can guarantee, look, here's my track record. They will give you ah papers which show you their portfolios, for example, the kind of thing that you would expect from a real financial organization, and they do their homework. So yeah, it's never a good thing to blame a victim for any of this. There's tiny, tiny tells, but you would be very hard pushed to spot them.
00:24:29
Speaker
That's really interesting because I think when we started hearing about these investment scams, they often started with um a relationship scam, you know, the random number.
00:24:41
Speaker
Oh, I'm sorry. And then a conversation and that turned into a relationship and that turned into Showing a flashy lifestyle, sending photos. I'm here, I'm there. do you know how I got this rich? I invested in crypto. My uncle taught me.
00:24:55
Speaker
That's kind of the older way we've we've seen this. It's still happening. Of course, we all get these wrong number messages. But what you're talking about is immediately attracting people through investment related ads. If you search online, it looks credible because there are good reviews. And they don't offer insane amounts. They offer amounts that that could be legitimate in some scenarios.
00:25:19
Speaker
And now stepping up with actually sounding like ah financial experts. So they've really honed in on the skill of if ah if this was a legitimate investment, how would we be able to communicate and how do we sound? And that is and next level credible credible for for victims. And um these are not AI bots either. These are real people who have, and um I know how old some of these domains are. They have years of experience in running this sort of scam. So that's who you're up against, real professionals who have done their homework on you.
00:26:01
Speaker
Scams don't begin with money moves. They begin when trust is manipulated one message at a time. Rangers AI builds ScamRanger to help step in before the damage, detecting scam messages and guiding people while they still have the power to
The Impact on Victims
00:26:16
Speaker
choose. And on the ScamRangers podcast, we bring you the voices on the front lines, experts, advocates, and leaders fighting back.
00:26:24
Speaker
Because stopping scams means protecting people before they're pulled in. Learn more at rangersai.com.
00:26:34
Speaker
And so you said that you had to sit through the sales pitch and really listen. and So tell me a little bit about that. What does that mean? So I was working on a scam bit with actually a couple of my um fellow colleagues, Trilogy Media. um So again, another YouTube channel who specialize in, in fact, these guys go after money mules a whole lot. um they They're both in the US. What they do is they they go after a number of different types of scams, but One of them was that they were looking into someone who had reached out to contact. In fact, it was the daughter of the person who had been scammed. Dan Moyer is his name. And his daughter, Elena, reached out to say, look my dad, he's about to lose his home.
00:27:17
Speaker
Right. So he launched was he had invested well over six hundred thousand Canadian dollars in this investment scam. Now, he had already withdrawn some of that in the early stages to to demonstrate basically that the whole thing was legitimate. So over the space of maybe a year and a half, he had watched his so-called investment grow so much up to the point where he was making enough money that he decided he could afford to renovate his home.
00:27:46
Speaker
He'd started that renovation based on the profit on paper anyway that he was making. But then whenever he went to withdraw those profits to pay for the renovation, then all the barriers went up. And the way these things usually work is they'll throw some sort of obstacle to say, well, you can't withdraw even ah any sort of large amount without giving more money in.
00:28:09
Speaker
And the more money in was you have to pay tax on that. You haven't reached a minimum threshold. You have to put more in. And that should never be an obstacle. if If it's a legitimate organization, you will be made very clear, it will be very clear that if it's a fixed term investment, then you can't withdraw until a certain date.
00:28:29
Speaker
But with these sorts of things, you're never told that. you never You will be told that, yeah, you can withdraw money at any time, but suddenly, whenever you want to withdraw a large amount, the barriers come up. And that's what happened in his case. And I think a big tell is you never have to pay taxes on top of what you invested. They deduct the taxable amounts when you withdraw the money or whatever. There are different ways to make arrangements for taxes, but definitely not adding more money. Correct. Correct. Yeah. And that's definitely a key tell after the event. But of course, if you have withdrawn smaller amounts in the past, this is the first time that you'll have seen any so anything which would raise a red red flag to you.
00:29:11
Speaker
And that's the horrible bit. And you're at their mercy, of course, at that point. They will not give you money. They will certainly not give you large amounts of money. They may drip feed you small amounts to keep you happy.
00:29:22
Speaker
And that was the case here. And only when he got to the point where they were refusing to give him any sort of withdrawal, then and only then did he figure out it was a scam. So his daughter, Elena, now he was in a position where his home was being renovated.
00:29:38
Speaker
And literally even to kind of keep himself going in this home, he had to take out a high rate mortgage, thinking this was only going to be a short term thing until he was able to withdraw the money.
00:29:51
Speaker
And he couldn't refinance at all because the house was wasn't in the state where it could even be refinanced. It was like in the middle of a a building where And because of that, he was stuck and he would have lost his home. And in the end, we had to raise a ah kind of GoFundMe for Dan and that prevented him from losing his home. But, you know, it shouldn't have to be like that. This was all because... he had seen an ad on Facebook where he was drawn in by this investment and he demonstrated himself that it was legitimate. So you have to feel sorry for him. But again, this is through the Meta platform. Meta would have known that this was a scam advert, be yet they tolerate it.
00:30:33
Speaker
Yeah, i think ah the ads showing ah deep fakes of celebrities should definitely concern the celebrities, too. um If I'm the CEO of Robin Hood or Elon Musk and there are ads in my name offering crypto, I would be very, very angry. So I'm wondering how long these celebrity impersonations scams are going. I know that celebrities like Keanu Reeves and others have have spoken, but this is another level of, you know, bad stuff happening that that needs to be stopped. um You know, it's it's and it's meta in the ads, but it's also, you know, if if meta enables this,
00:31:14
Speaker
then it's easy for the scammers to find their victims. But if Meta doesn't enable this, then we still have these scammers looking for the victims in other ways. So it also requires another level of takedown. And I know that we have now the strike force in the U.S. that's supposed to go after the scam call centers. But again, if governments don't wake up and see this national security threat, I don't know what the future will be. it They have to wake up.
Government Actions Against Scams
00:31:41
Speaker
I agree, but you know's it's good. And that was one of the big positives out of GASA was that there's a strike force, you say, that you go in and get these cost centers because everyone knows where they are. Everyone can pinpoint them. you know It's not as if you know it's on the dark web somewhere. Nobody knows who's behind it. They do know.
00:32:00
Speaker
um Now, not all of them, but at the same time, if if I were in government, um I would actually be doing exactly what I'm doing as a scam builder and employing people to follow these ads and see where they lead. Okay, because it's not always obvious exactly who the scammers are.
00:32:19
Speaker
And if I was meta, I would be making the excuse, well, how do I know it's a scam? you know, it's not always going to be obvious. And maybe there are finance companies whose ads look almost the same. So they're okay, they won't have celebrities. But a lot of the ads that I've seen don't use celebrities, but they will still use a load of buzzwords together, fill in your details. And until you get to the point where you are 100% confident that it's a scam, you can get the Lexa meta going, well, I, you know, I can't prove whether it is or it isn't. So that's not my job.
00:32:52
Speaker
So let's make it somebody's job. Let's let's do the scam bidding. Let's see when you initially invest in something, what sort of stories are being told. And if someone tells you, hey, there's no risk with this.
00:33:05
Speaker
You've got to know it's a scam almost instantly. And if it's a real financial company, they can say things like that. You can use a little bit of technical expertise. You you have to look at the website they're pointing you to. You look at the age of that website and you go, hey, that's only been set up in the last few weeks.
00:33:21
Speaker
it's going to be a scam. You know, it's not that difficult to figure this out. And Meta can do this. So if Meta aren't sure that it's if it's a scam or not, hey, use some of those profits to go and set up a few people to actually fill in some fake details and see what happens. And I guarantee you, you'll be able to figure out whether it's a scam ad or not pretty quickly.
00:33:44
Speaker
Have you, in your research, clicking on those links and and going and filling out information, have you reached legitimate sites? No, not once ever. I can guarantee if it's got those three buzzwords with the word investment in there, literally, and i can I've recorded everything that I've done never once. Has anybody called me out of the blue, used my fake name, and it's turned out to be legit? Not once. And I've been doing this for well over two years.
00:34:11
Speaker
In fact, worse than that. If you actually invest anything at all in these websites, even if it's only that initial $200 or $250, your details will be sold to people who not only are fellow fake investment scammers, but you will also get the people who will try and recover the money for you.
00:34:31
Speaker
Okay. So you invested $250 there. That was a scam. They will tell you, but actually what they're after is yet more money. So that your own details are being sold by investment scammers to recovery scammers who actually work in the office beside them.
00:34:48
Speaker
Okay. So they work hand in hand with recovery scammers. if if you've lost money on a crypto investment, you can guarantee if you get a call out of the blue saying, we're going to recover your money, that will also be a scam. 100% of the time.
00:35:05
Speaker
That's really interesting. i Definitely recovery scammers are the scum of the earth, but actually the scammers themselves going and I would didn't think about it that way. So the scammers themselves going and offering the recovery services or selling it to someone else to offer the recovery services, that's a whole other level of of cruelty.
00:35:24
Speaker
It is. I mean, I actually get more phone calls from recovery scammers using several of my fake names than I do almost any other type of scam at the minute.
00:35:34
Speaker
And that's another big change that I've seen. So the recovery scammers, they're absolutely relentless. And they're in different parts of the world, but mostly in Eastern Europe, mostly, believe it or not, in the Republic of Georgia. So not Georgia, the state, as in the Balkan country in Tbilisi.
00:35:53
Speaker
And they're set up almost identically. And I am wondering to myself why on earth that is. And literally, it's down to the same software that I see on the scammers' computers, the same scripts. so A lot of scams are scripted, same script, obviously.
00:36:09
Speaker
But also the know-how seems to be transferred between different groups. And it's almost as if they've had the same trainer. You know, it's they are set up so identically. They will use MMD soft for their...
00:36:24
Speaker
their VoIP software. They will use the CRM system, which has been developed specifically for crypto recovery scams. There's a whole infrastructure which has been created in that area of the world just to run this sort of scam.
00:36:40
Speaker
And you can see the the components. like It's almost like scamming as a service in that country at the minute. It is so, ah ah you know, each group is almost identical. And I would love to know the story behind that one. Is there one group who figured out that this is a really successful way of running a scam?
00:37:00
Speaker
And they've kind of like run it as a little enterprise and they'll sell this as a service to other people. It's just the setups are just amazingly similar. Interesting. So the original information comes from the scam call centers or the scam centers in Southeast Asia and the details of those victims. And they do their craft, which is craft, quote unquote, which is the cryptocurrency investment scams. And then they sell the data to recovery scammers in Georgia.
00:37:30
Speaker
I mean, it it doesn't necessarily have to be the the, I've seen similar investment scammers in South America, but on Southeast Asia as well. But the majority of the recovery scammers for some reason are in Eastern Europe.
00:37:46
Speaker
So don't know why. and it might be just that I have asked some of the scammers and when I confront them said, how did you get into this? But again, it's the same answer. You know, they'll just deny that they're even scamming. You know, they're there. They will still claim once I confront them, they will say, you know, we're genuinely trying to help you, even though I know they've given me fake documents. I know i actually watched one scammer when I said because I make them work a little bit for their money.
00:38:15
Speaker
Okay. So I say, well, how do I know this isn't a scam? And that is purely to make them do a bit of work. I want to see your driving license and your passport.
00:38:25
Speaker
And I watched one group go to somebody in Russia to try and get a UK, a fake UK driving license. So he could send this to me, but I was watching his computer as he did that. And he had to pay about $300 this fake driving license.
00:38:38
Speaker
for this fake driving license and i was thinking that's great because then the next spot is he will when you have a uk driving license it has your address on it and i told him hey i went to your address and knocked your door and you don't live there and it was kind of satisfying to able to say like you just wasted 300 of your own money because even though i knew you know he was based in treblisi and he yeah he obviously wasn't going to be at that address but I didn't have to go there. I just confronted them. It's very nice to be able to do that. My goal is not only to expose scams and scammers, but actually to cause them a bit of pain. And if they have to spend their own money on something, that's a little bit of a win for me. Yeah. So how much do you think there's awareness of these recovery scam centers? I think there's a lot of, you know, there's there's definitely a lot of awareness around the investment scams, but I don't think the recovery scams are getting enough attention. No, I agree. And, you know, these are the real bottom feeders because this, they're obviously targeting people who they believe have lost money. And most of them have, I've listened to their calls. Most of them have you're talking. And ah the reason why I think it even works is you're talking about desperate people,
00:39:52
Speaker
who have the kind of sunken cost fallacy you know maybe if i have a little bit more money i will get some of that back and that's similar to the investment scam where they're kind of saying hey you need to pay taxes you're going well i've put in so much already maybe i should put in a little bit more it's exactly the same thing they're reliant on people who they basically promise an advance fee, you know, it's back to the 419 thing again.
00:40:19
Speaker
But because you've invested your own money and time at this stage, I guess it's more likely that you're going to put a little bit more in to see if you get a lot more out.
00:40:31
Speaker
And I think the the scammers, unfortunately, in this position, take full advantage of that because they're not the most successful. They're not going to get life-changing sums, but they will get enough that will keep them going. and And sometimes, particularly if they, what they really want, of course, is access to your computer so that they can see you setting up your digital wallet.
00:40:52
Speaker
And when they have, usually it's 12 words. And when they have those 12 words, if you ever put anything into that wallet, then they can immediately take it out. And because it's so easy for them to get money like that,
00:41:05
Speaker
and They don't have to go through banks. They don't have to do anything. They just need 12 words. And if they have those 12 words, they will concentrate on you like anything because it's going to be so easy for them to get money. All they need to persuade you to do is put money into that wallet. you know And they'll they'll give you all sorts of stories like, hey, you're the only one with that password. I was disconnected when you created that password.
00:41:30
Speaker
And that's true. Yeah, you can protect it with a password. But if you have the 12 words, that's the master key, of course. So, you know, matter how much you've password protected it. They can use those 12 words to take the money out. And that's why this sort of scam is as popular as it is. It's just so easy. And it only takes, you know a minute or so to make one of these digital wallets. If they see you do that, then it's their wallet.
00:41:55
Speaker
So to clarify, the recovery scammers will try to get access to your computer by saying, in order to help you, I need access to see what exactly happened and show me the trace of the investment scam. And then they get by by remote accessing your computer, they start to get the information they need in order to take over your digital wallet.
00:42:16
Speaker
They want road exit for two reasons. The first one is actually, and the whole reason for asking about, well, what's your history, is they will want you to show your bank account. And obviously, they will see how much money you've got in there. And from that moment, they will target that amount of money.
00:42:31
Speaker
um The second thing is, yes, when they will say, look, in order your money is hidden away in ah some crypto wallet, but we've been able to find it on the internet. It's on the blockchain. All we need to do is verify who you are.
00:42:46
Speaker
OK, and what they will then say is, well, show me your bank account. You need to create a crypto wallet to receive this. They will watch you create that wallet. Take a note of those 12 words and then they'll say, we're going to put your return, your money to that wallet.
00:43:02
Speaker
But then they will say, but in order to prove your identity, you need what they'll term liquidity in that wallet. In other words, you need to put money in there.
00:43:13
Speaker
okay But don't worry about putting that money in because it's your wallet. but When you put money in there, it's still your money. not telling them, of course, they have the 12 words and can instantly take that out. And that's where we're going to put, but you need to have money in there to prove that you own that wallet.
00:43:29
Speaker
An empty wallet is no good. yeah Put the money in and then they're going to return this vast sum, but of course you've got to put money in there first. Wow. Awful, absolutely awful scam. Well, we can go on and on but I think for today, we've learned a lot. Thank you so much, Jim. i I had one last question and maybe it goes back to the Global Anti-Scam Online Summit, maybe it doesn't.
00:43:52
Speaker
From your work, you see really horrible things and and methods. What are you hopeful about in terms of our ability to drive change in this and really you know see the other see the light at the end of this tunnel, the
Hope in the Fight Against Scams
00:44:07
Speaker
scam tunnel?
00:44:07
Speaker
Well, mean, there's a couple of things. I mean, I was on stage with Kitboga and a lot of people think, well, scammers are going to use AI to, you know, promote their their scams, take people out of the equation. Equally, scambators can use the same technology. And I've sat with Kitboga over the summertime and we let loose an army of anti-scam bots against certain scam call centers. And we were able to watch the results on CCTV, which we haven't published this yet, but It's incredibly satisfying to watch a scammer chase his tail. And that's always been the goal of some of this is to cause them pain. And I'll never shut down a call center. um At the end of the day, um it's kind of funny to watch it, you know, but they are not scamming your relatives, your parents, your children. At the same time. You're kicking them out of action. Okay. So that's one nice thing. We can use AI against scammers just as much as they can use against us. But the other thing is that we're starting to get a little bit more traction from the police and from financial organizations to help to tackle this. Now, Meta at the minute might be the exception to that. But the one thing that I did pick up from GASA was there's things like Global Signals Exchange. We have financial institutions and organizations
00:45:24
Speaker
all working together. I made quite a few contacts in there where I have, for example, Canadian victims and having a smooth route into somebody who can actually do something makes a big difference. So I think the fact that gas is there at all really helps in this fight. And yes, scambaders have a role to play.
00:45:43
Speaker
And I'm quite happy to sit with financial institutions and law enforcement and actually anybody else who wants to really understand scams so that they can work in the weak spots of it.
00:45:55
Speaker
So for me, the bit that is the kind of bright area of this is there is a genuine want, a desire to try and tackle some of this. And I think, and although, yes, there's the scale of scams has crept up quite a bit in the last number of years. It's, I think, starting to plateau now. People are becoming more aware of scams. People are you know on the defence against it. We'll never solve it, ever.
00:46:22
Speaker
But that's not the point. The point is trying to fight it. And my hope is, if you can go to the same conference in GASA next year, you'll find that maybe a lot of countries are starting to get the slope going the other way, where there's a lot less money going out to scammers than there used to be. And that, for me, is the most positive part about it. And we all have a role to play in that.
00:46:43
Speaker
Yeah. And we're present and i I hope we'll see the curve bending in negatively, which is going to be a positive outcome.
00:46:57
Speaker
Well, Jim, thank you so much for your time today and for all the knowledge that you've bestowed on us, that you've provided to us. Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. You're very welcome. Thank you.