[Closed] Son has been involved in a Bitcoin scam ... any advice on recovering his money?

Has he been scammed ? Illegally?

If not it’s going to be a hard push to get anyone to do anything.
If it’s been illegal then persue it through legal means. Possibly with the help of his bank ?

How did he pay?
I'm not sure he has brought any crypto probably just sent money to a bogus exchange.
Has he got a wallet address for his crypto? exchange log in details ect?

Has he got a wallet address for his crypto? exchange log in details ect?

He probably doesn't even have a wallet, I suspect he just transferred money from his bank account to the fraudsters thinking he was paying into one.

I suspect nothing you can do as the other end of outside the UK and he transferred the money of his own accord.

How was the money transferred? If credit/debit card you may be able to dispute the transaction. The banks are bust blocking bitcoin exchanges at the moment at the request of the FCA.

Report to the FTC in the USA - link

Not sure what can be done but try Action Fraud to pass over the details of accounts and where the money went... they may use these bits of info to help a bigger case or shut something down so others don't suffer the same misfortune.

Hi all, thanks. OK, he has paid the money direct from his Starling bank account.

I don't understand Bitcoin/wallets but I think you're right that he probably hasn't bought any actual Bitcoin, as I gather that's quite tricky to do.

When he's home from work, we'll get his bank account up and post details.

And will register this with FTC.

Thanks again

If he's sent Bitcoin it's gone and there's nothing that can be done.

I don't know if he's really bought any bitcoin or just transferred his money to someone unscrupulous, but it sounds very similar to the circumstances here - in which case you may be able to recoup the funds if his bank didn't red flag the repeated transactions and question them? Emptying your account when you usually spend nothing should trigger a warning I think.

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/what-to-do-if-you-re-the-victim-of-a-bank-transfer-app-scam-aED6A0l529rc

I'm afraid there's next to zero chance of getting money back from the scammer. I'd bet they're not really in the US.

Speak to Starling, they might be able to help, but I wouldn't hold out much hope.

Hannah ... that looks slightly hopeful. Will pursue with Starling Bank when he gets home.

Is there any recourse / helpful that

- he's got dyspraxia
- his funds in his bank account went from c.£8000 (highest its ever been) to £50 in the course of 3 days (3 payments), when his typical spending pattern is £100-200 per month for the previous 24months?

And I appreciate he did this all voluntarily 🙁

Sadly it doesn't sound like you've got any chance of recovering the money - police in this country will be hampered by it being cross-border (and in reality the costs of investigating wouldn't be worth it given the low likelihood of a conviction). Worth reporting to Action Fraud in this country but unless they get a lot of similar reports they probably wouldn't do much either (and it would be more taking down Facebook sites etc. - they wouldn't recover the money for you).

Premier Icon
Aus
Free Member

And I appreciate he did this all voluntarily 🙁

Nobody gets scammed voluntarily.

Hopefully the bank will step up for him

Is there any recourse / helpful that

– he’s got dyspraxia
– his funds in his bank account went from c.£8000 (highest its ever been) to £50 in the course of 3 days (3 payments), when his typical spending pattern is £100-200 per month for the previous 24months?

The rules around spotting suspicious activity on accounts and a bank's responsibility have changed a lot in the last year or two. I'd suspect you may have an argument that your son being in a vulnerable group with his dyspraxia means the bank should have been more suspicious but that may depend on whether they were aware of it. I would be pushing the bank for an answer about why it wasn't flagged but also get yourself over to the Money Saving Expert forums, it's full of incredibly helpful and knowledgeable people who can cut through the rumours and get you in the right direction.

My wife got scammed in a slightly different way - when I heard how it happened I was gob smacked my wife went along with it. She basically authorised funds to be paid away vi online banking. I had to bite my tongue a bit on it - if I were the bank I’d say she breached all their warnings about fraud and t&cs when you sign up to online banking.

However, they actually bit the bullet and refunded her all of the money even though they only managed to block about 1/8th of it being paid away. Fair play for that - was HSBC.

So you may get lucky if Starling follow a similar policy. Given they’re a start up bank with no old legacy systems to hinder them they ought to be better at flagging / blocking this sort of thing really.

FYI - check with your son ASAP on how the funds were sent. If he willingly sent them that’s one thing - if they somehow have access to his online banking and they scammed him to get the codes to pay away then make sure the online banking is completely reset so they have no access to initiate payments / see how much he has in there.

The rules around spotting suspicious activity on accounts and a bank’s responsibility have changed a lot in the last year or two

Barclays 'solution' is to pop up an 'Is this a scam?' notification every time I do anything on their App, including paying £20 to the milkman, who I've being paying by bank transfer for years. The daft thing is, it pops up before you've entered any details, so clicking 'OK' and ignoring it just becomes automated behaviour. It would be much better is it waited till you'd entered the details eg the amount and then showed a warning if it looked suspicious or was above a certain amount, or a new account etc etc.

I'd say you have pretty much zero chance unfortunately.

I recovered a significant amount of money from a bank who I won't name after my terminally ill mother was scammed (not bitcoin). My advice is that you escalate as high as you can up the customer services tree and make a real point about your sons vulnerability. You will be told "no" many times but keep fighting. Action fraud and the police will sit drinking from their chocolate teapot.

In my case it took multiple phone calls and a letter to the CEO. Suddenly they changed their minds, refunded and gave us compensation. Mum ended up quids in from being scammed. I repeat that you must never give up but equally must always be super polite and try and get them to sympathise.

I wish you all the best as this was a torrid time for me and my family. The scammers have arrest warrants out for them now but it's taken nearly 2 years

She basically authorised funds to be paid away vi online banking

That is how nearly all scams work, they just persuade the person to give away all their money (APP - Authorised Push Payment fraud). They're very good at it as well, eg all sorts of white collar professionals fall for it.

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/what-to-do-if-you-re-the-victim-of-a-bank-transfer-app-scam-aED6A0l529rc

I think maybe "bitcoin" is a red herring here. If he's actually bought bitcoin then it's not really a scam, he's bought bitcoin and can sell it again. If on the other hand he's received nothing whatsoever for his money then the scam is "my son was tricked into giving someone money" and it doesn't really matter whether the bait was bitcoin or two dozen boxes of frozen sausages and a freshly mown lawn.

Where I'm going with this is, if you present it as a 'bitcoin scam' then it might scare off or confuse people who may otherwise be able to deal with it. What it sounds more like to me is a confidence scam.

Agree with all above. I would only add that the more people who hassle the banks and teh faster you hassle the bank the quicker theuy are at taking these people down.

I would think your suspicion is correct and they have not bought anything. They have just made a payment or a transfer of funds to another account. That account is most likely live and active and the sooner you can get on it the sooner that it will get blocked / flagged for fraud.

If your son's been tricked into giving someone all his money. Contact the bank and speak to them about it. You've got to be persistent and reinforce the message to them that your son is vulnerable from this sort of scam. keep at them, write to as high up a person as you can..

so clicking ‘OK’ and ignoring it just becomes automated behaviour. It would be much better is it waited till you’d entered the details eg the amount and then showed a warning if it looked suspicious or was above a certain amount, or a new account etc etc.

RBS does it in the other order, and you actually have to pick why you are sending it (e.g. gift, payment etc) - still becomes a bit automatic. I agree it would be better if there was some sort of risk scoring that made the behaviour change depending on where/what/how you were sending etc.

Barclays ‘solution’ is to pop up an ‘Is this a scam?’ notification every time I do anything on their App, including paying £20 to the milkman, who I’ve being paying by bank transfer for years. The daft thing is, it pops up before you’ve entered any details, so clicking ‘OK’ and ignoring it just becomes automated behaviour. It would be much better is it waited till you’d entered the details eg the amount and then showed a warning if it looked suspicious or was above a certain amount, or a new account etc etc.

Nationwide have one on the screen you set up a payment on and a further one where you confirm they're correct. They occasionally change the layout and wording too so that it doesn't become overly familiar and you just click through anyway. They also make it larger and more to-the-point if you make payments to the same account multiple times in quick succession, I only found that out when I made 3 payments to my credit card over 2 days which made me smile. They were essentially trying to warn me that them asking me to pay off their credit card might be a scam!

Thanks again. I'm going through his emails (with his permission) and looks like he's used several crypto sites, unless of course, these are all dodgy. However, the sites, and clicking through on his transaction id looks pretty convincing to my uneducated eye.

I think approaching Starling might be good as he's, within the last 2 weeks, set up Swift payments for decent sums (e.g. USD $2500) which he's never done before, and made payments to Crypto.com, Blockchain, Coinmama and Moonpay.

Without wanting to put him down, I'd be staggered if/that he's managed to organise Swift payments, deal with a (dodgy) broker, buy bits of Bitcoin, transfer wallet etc. He often struggles with fairly day-to-day stuff, and usually needs a confidence boost to 'do' something, esp if new or seemingly complicated.

Without wanting to put him down, I’d be staggered if/that he’s managed to organise Swift payments, deal with a (dodgy) broker, buy bits of Bitcoin, transfer wallet etc.

A very friendly and enthusiastic scam artist will have talked him through it all, making him feel successful and on his way to making a fortune etc. He'll have given all the time necessary to helping him get it right. They do it for a living and are very good at it.

Without wanting to put him down, I’d be staggered if/that he’s managed to organise Swift payments, deal with a (dodgy) broker, buy bits of Bitcoin, transfer wallet etc. He often struggles with fairly day-to-day stuff, and usually needs a confidence boost to ‘do’ something, esp if new or seemingly complicated.

Do you know if he gave the scammer remote access to his computer/phone then? If he struggles to do some day-to-day stuff then maybe he did and if that is the case then be wary of using it as it may well have malware on it.

NB If all else fails, I'd write to the Sunday Times Money section, they are always championing fraud victims aganst the banks and have a good track record of embarrassing banks into refunding victims of push payment fraud.

Thanks again all, feeling pretty shocked by all that's gone on.

So when son's home, we'll talk to the bank. His recent spending activity is massively different to his historical spend.

My understanding is that “Cheryl (his broker)” offered to trade crypto currencies on his behalf and offered him fabulous returns. He then transferred money to her via a Bitcoin wallet so he would have deposited funds into one of the crypto exchange apps which then converts his £ to Bitcoin which he then transferred to her. She then said that she had set up a trading account in his name and sent him daily emails showing how much money she had made for him as well as demanding more money along the way (“i forgot to tell you that there is an additional fee” etc). The problem is anyone can set up a wallet to receive Jake’s bitcoins. I may be wrong but I think he has bought bitcoin but only so that he can transfer it to her and then she’s just pocketed it and asked for more. She pretended to work for Bitgo which is a legislate company but they only trade crypto for institutional investors as far as I’m aware (e.g. asset managers, pension funds etc).

Barclays ‘solution’ is to pop up an ‘Is this a scam?’ notification every time I do anything on their App, including paying £20 to the milkman, who I’ve being paying by bank transfer for years. The daft thing is, it pops up before you’ve entered any details, so clicking ‘OK’ and ignoring it just becomes automated behaviour. It would be much better is it waited till you’d entered the details eg the amount and then showed a warning if it looked suspicious or was above a certain amount, or a new account etc etc.

The difficulty is - from the bank's point of view that warning always needs to be there but from the the customer's point of view it always being there means you cease to notice it. But also, of course, someone who is being scammed doesnt think they are being scammed - so the answer to 'is this a scam' is of course 'no'.

But I'm also surprised the bank didn't see this as suspicious activity  - even with my business account which frequently has transactions in the 10s of 1000s would see multiple transactions to the same recipient as suspicious and halt the transaction until they had further verification.  In fact a couple of days ago that happened even though the recipient for the transactions was.... me.

I wonder if in the OP's case the money being taken in more than one transaction was to keep the individual totals under an amount that the bank would be moved to intervene.

Form the OP's position theres several courses of action - one is making sure its reported to the relevant authorities including whatever service providers (social media co or whatever) that  facilitated the targeting of the fraud, one is notifying and pursuing it with the bank - but another is checking through things like you're household insurance - this is theft and you have insurance against things being stolen so check whether this situation falls within the scope of any policies you have.

A friend had a similar scam (not bitcoin but it did add up to about £15000) happen to their daughter and when she spoke to the bank about the issue and explained that her daughter had reasoning issues and was immature for her age++ the bank put some sort of notice on her account to prevent future incidents (if there is a transaction that looks out of the normal).
They also refunded the money .....

Haven't read all of this, but if you haven't already opened a case with the bank, do so ASAP.

They do it for a living and are very good at it.

Indeed  - you've outlined your son's particular vulnerabilities but the reality is any of us could find ourselves in a situation like this.

Thanks again all, feeling pretty shocked by all that’s gone on.

So when son’s home, we’ll talk to the bank. His recent spending activity is massively different to his historical spend.

My understanding is that “Cheryl (his broker)” offered to trade crypto currencies on his behalf and offered him fabulous returns. He then transferred money to her via a Bitcoin wallet so he would have deposited funds into one of the crypto exchange apps which then converts his £ to Bitcoin which he then transferred to her.

I think unfortunately that will make it impossible to guilt the bank into refunding it.

They've transferred it, and he's received the bitcoins (or fractions of) and he's then given the bitcoins to someone else. But as far as the initial transaction with his bank is concerned he's not been defrauded?

I doubt the wallets will be even remotely interested.

I think unfortunately that will make it impossible to guilt the bank into refunding it.

No, there is a voluntary code where banks refund victims of APP fraud. IIRC Natwest is best, refunding something like 95%.

https://www.ukfinance.org.uk/press/press-releases/app-scams-voluntary-code-seven-launch

Ok so all he has done give his cash to a con artist just like buying London bridge.
Don't let him get too down over it they are very good at stealing money. Forgot the Nigerian prince emails we all sneer at they are professional thiefs.

Banks will pass you off as #he did not carry out due diligence#
But don't let them if your son has issues. Make them look at his historical spend.

A doctor friend of mine bank transferred 13k for a t5 camper that was just photo on ebay he lost the lot and I know a young co worker who is a social wallflower that got sucked into giving a cam girl Amazon gift cards. Don't let your son feel guilty they are very good at their job on praying on people .

No, there is a voluntary code where banks refund victims of APP fraud. IIRC Natwest is best, refunding something like 95%.

I've read that and I don't think you're right (feel free to point out the specific bit if I've missed it).

The banks transferred his money to the coin exchange or whoever, and in return they've given him bitcoins.

He's then sent those bitcoins to the fraudster.

Surely the whole point of that fraud is that the bank has no interaction with the fraudster and therefore can't claw it back.

Like transfering money from the bank to a roofer to re-do the flashing. Then someone stealing the lead off your roof.

Edit "ish" have you got actual crypto addresses then?
Something like 1BvBMSEYstWetqTFn5Au4m4GFg7xJaNVN2.

If you have copy it into here https://www.blockchain.com/explorer
I've not used that site for checking coin address but you could try it

@Aus I know people who got scammed out of everything and got it all back under the APP. Just make sure you pursue it with the bank - don't make the judgement yourself (or let your son make it) that he got tricked. That's the point - the bank is supposed to put measures in place to protect people from getting tricked. Multiple large transfers that are out of character being allowed to go through suggests that those measures aren't in place/adequate. Being tricked doesn't mean you're stupid - it just means the scammers knew exactly what they were doing and how to be convincing. Good luck, it's a horrible situation.

The banks transferred his money to the coin exchange or whoever, and in return they’ve given him bitcoins.

He’s then sent those bitcoins to the fraudster.

Sounds unnecessarily complex to me, if I was a fraudster I'd direct my 'clients' to a cloned website which looks like a real one but is just a sham. They then buy / transfer whatever when really they're just transferring the money to an account I control. 5 mins later the money is transferered off to a range of different accounts / bank etc.

Buying real bitcoins and transfering them via an exchange would all be tracable (to a BC address), so leaving an unnecessary paper trail.

I don't think the actual details matter, it was APP fraud, he fell for it and the bank won't get any money back as it's long gone through half a dozen accounts around the world. Given his issues, he should qualify for a refund.

If the bank declines to refund, I'd target every newspaper finance agony aunt out there. If one of them takes it up, the bank will refund just for the publicity. Story like this every week in the Sunday Times Money section.

NB vulnerable teenagers are often groomed to act as mules, they receive the money, withdraw it as cash and give it to the fraudsters (in exhchange for a small cut).

Again, thank you all. This where STW is brilliant, really appreciate the practical pointers and the support.

We've been on a long call with the bank, so that's underway. And re Hannah's point, we'll push.

We're working through all the other bits. Thankfully son is doing well, probably I'm more gutted.

As @stwhannah said, your son needs to contact his banks fraud team ASAP. it might be recoverable, it might not be.

The bit coin bubble burst years ago, but there's loads of stuff on social; about investihng in it, and people simply stealing money.

It's like the new version of ponzi schemes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme

Good Luck. Sounds like your son is ambitious to make money and do well.

Really hope you he gets his money back. & well done all for the good advice.

Just to reiterate that if this was multiple out of the ordinary payments the bank should have stopped them. I bought a motorbike earlier this Yr, made a test payment to the seller of £100 as deposit, when I came to pay the few £k balance the next day, bank wouldn't let it through without referring to their anti fraud dept.

it might be recoverable, it might not be.

Not a hope, within 30 secs of his money being transferred it will have zoomed off to half a dozen different accounts with different banks. It's a well tested and understood method, happens to 100s of people every single day.

Thankfully son is doing well, probably I’m more gutted.

To be honest, he'll have learnt a valuable lesson from this. I know it's little consolation but this sort of thing happens to pensioners who then loose everything they have and no chance to earn anymore money etc. At least he's young enough to bounce back and may yet get it all refunded.

footflaps

Not a hope, within 30 secs of his money being transferred it will have zoomed off to half a dozen different accounts with different banks.

I know it’s little consolation but this sort of thing happens to pensioners who then loose everything they have and no chance to earn anymore money etc.

The Mum of a friend of mine was scammed out of £17k which was withdrawn from her account & while it was massively stressful she got it all back without a great deal of bother.
I wouldn't write it off just yet.

We are seeing the frequency of banks refunding customers who get scammed is steadily increasing. Including when the bank has not (as far as we can tell) been at fault. Anecdotal I know, but definitely trending that way in our small part of the scamming world. So worth pushing the bank.

It’s frightening how good some of these scammers are. And next to impossible to recover the money or trace the culprits.

The regulator (and ombudsman) are very keen that banks spot events (transfers) that are not "normal" for the account. I've seen some cases ruled on by FOS where old dude transfers money out by going in branch; then repeats the transaction for the following 3 days.

That bank was held accountable for the 3 payments but not the first. The clerk who processed the first transfer did ask about where it was going and was satisfied by the customer's story... but the clerk for the following days should have spotted the pattern and prevented further payments.

Is the bank aware he might be considered as vulnerable? I'd be pushing back on the bank massively.

Friend of a friends elderly parents went in to their bank and got the bank staff to help them transfer the money (thousands) to the police to help with a police investigation. The daughters were persistent and the bank eventually refunded the money. I think the bank was swayed by the fact that a member of their team helped transfer the money, but it is another example of the fact that this is not a hopeless case. Good luck!

Real sorry to hear your son got caught up in a scam. They're absolutely rife right now.

Just to clear up as I saw some people under the impression it's hard to buy bitcoin - it's very simple to buy bitcoin these days. Even simpler to send it to someone. You can do it in a matter of about 6/7 taps on the Coinbase app. You just pay via debit card, all from your phone just like buying something from Amazon.

The Bitcoin in the scam makes it hard to recover and trace your money - your ££ goes to the exchange, who aren't part of the scam. They've just exchanged your £ for BTC. Then they send your BTC to whomever you tell them too.

Your best bet, as said a few times already, is to report to your bank and ActionFraud.

Sounds unnecessarily complex to me, if I was a fraudster I’d direct my ‘clients’ to a cloned website which looks like a real one but is just a sham. They then buy / transfer whatever when really they’re just transferring the money to an account I control. 5 mins later the money is transferered off to a range of different accounts / bank etc.
....................

the bank won’t get any money back as it’s long gone through half a dozen accounts around the world. Given his issues, he should qualify for a refund.

Surely that's the whole point.

The bank made a legitimate transfer to wherever it is you buy bitcoins from. Nothing suspicious about that, lots of people, unfortunately, buy and sell cryptocurrency. If the bank does refund him then I'm happy for him, but I can't see how they're legally or morally obliged to do so. They didn't transfer any money to the fraudster. Like any other product, I can't see how the bank has a responsibility for what he then does with it. They don't for example insure my bikes just because I bought them with my debit cards.

The OP's son then made a transfer of that bitcoin to someone else. The coin exchanges, wallets etc that form the "banks" for cryptocurrencies aren't regulated like retail banks are, so there's absolutely zero chance of convincing them to reverse the payment, even if you can see where the money is now on the blockchain which is probably just another anonymous wallet, that's kinda the point, unless you can figure out some real-world transactions related to that wallet it's just a load of encrypted gibberish.

If the fraudster had got him to transfer the funds directly then I'd absolutely agree that there was a chance of that beig reversed or at least a paper trail that could be followed.

There's been examples of similar scams where people have been convinced to buy things like thousands of pounds of amazon gift cards then send the redemtion codes to fraudsters. They're equally valuable on the black market amongst criminals as they're easy to transfer.

If ive understood correctly, the scammer persuaded your son to buy Bitcoin, and then as a separate transaction those bitcoin wallets were sent to the scammer?
Assuming thats correct:
Unfortunately, there is nothing scammy about buying bitcoin. That half of the transaction is isolated. What he did with his shiny new bitcoin is up to him, so there is no recourse. Its part of the scam, effectively laundering the transaction?

a couple of grand being taken by the account holder isnt going to flag a warning to a bank. He couldve been buying anything with his new income a first car, a new bike?

Life lesson. Chalk it up and move on.

Update - we're struggling to really know if he's actually bought Bitcoin or if it's a front. Because a lot was done on whatsapp/Instagram and now has disappeared, the 'trail' isn't too good, and son, bless him, is just pretty confused.

However, we've had a long first chat with the bank, and they've responded v quickly in getting their fraud team on it and we're now having to provide some detail. No idea if that's hopeful, but they've been v empathetic to him and me, so credit to them for that.

And fully agree that son was the one who made the decision to transfer funds. The one oddity to me, is that his bank account (which is 3 years old) has very regualr monthly transactions, totalling on average £120, primarily local shops of Costa (his work lunch!), the Co-Op ... and that's about it. He lives a pretty quiet life. So to suddenly have multiple sums, and some large e.g. £2522 being paid to Crypto is unusual for him. But lesson certainly being learned!

Unfortunately, there is nothing scammy about buying bitcoin.

Theres nothing scammy about buying sandwiches but if I trick or coerce someone into buying me a sandwich then thats a scam. It doesnt matter if the tools used to implement the scam also have legitimate functions. The OP's son has been relieved of money and has had nothing of worth in return, but has been lead to believe he would have - thats a scam.

I am hungry incidentally and accept PayPal gift.

he OP’s son has been relieved of money and has had nothing of worth in return

I think that’s the issue. The Bitcoin was issued to him, he’s just then gifted it to the scammer as I understand it.

Still a scam, but much harder to get anything back out of it.

did he pay on debit card or bank transfer?

bank authorizations are a dark art - just because something is out of pattern to the human eye doesn't mean it'll be picked up, especially if multi-factor-authentication is used for a low-risk merchant.

Well, if anyone can interpret this - the messaging conversation for son's first purchase it'd be good to understand what's actually been bought:

Let’s proceed then
[21/06/2021, 5:34:03 pm] Cheryl: Do you’ve your starting capital of 3k now on your account?
[21/06/2021, 5:34:30 pm] son: I need to set it up first, how do I do that?
[21/06/2021, 5:39:37 pm] Cheryl: I’ll be the one trading for you at first alright so you can see how it’s all done.. so if you choose to reinvest with our platform, you can know how to go about the trading and how you can earn massively in just a week.. You’ll need to register a live trading account with my company’s platform tho so you can be able to monitor your trading and also be able to make withdrawal of your profit
[21/06/2021, 5:40:07 pm] Cheryl: But first you’ll need a Bitcoin wallet were you’ll need to purchase Bitcoin with your starting capital of $3000 cause we do trade via Bitcoin
[21/06/2021, 5:40:50 pm] son: Is it downloadable off the App Store?
[21/06/2021, 5:42:02 pm] Cheryl: I’m gonna give you a link were you can set up a wallet and also be able to purchase Bitcoin with your starting capital
[21/06/2021, 5:42:28 pm] Cheryl: Coinmama.com
[21/06/2021, 5:42:46 pm] Cheryl: Kindly click on this link now and send me the screenshot
‎[21/06/2021, 5:43:28 pm] son: ‎<attached: 00000038-PHOTO-2021-06-21-17-43-28.jpg>
[21/06/2021, 5:44:12 pm] Cheryl: Good
Now put the amount you wanna buy (3k) then click on buy and send me the screenshot
‎[21/06/2021, 5:46:06 pm] son: ‎<attached: 00000040-PHOTO-2021-06-21-17-46-06.jpg>
[21/06/2021, 5:46:12 pm] son: This is where I got to
[21/06/2021, 5:46:35 pm] Cheryl: Good
[21/06/2021, 5:46:37 pm] Cheryl: 14vKty9esTp24K1G9qXRFUAShpj36bcnnk
[21/06/2021, 5:47:16 pm] Cheryl: That’s my company’s Bitcoin wallet address.. copy it and past it on the Bitcoin wallet address option and then proceed further
[21/06/2021, 5:48:08 pm] Cheryl: Send me the screenshot if you’re having any issues
[21/06/2021, 5:49:55 pm] Cheryl: Copy the Bitcoin wallet address and past it on the Bitcoin wallet address option
[21/06/2021, 5:50:52 pm] son: Is there any chance of a referral code? Im struggling
[21/06/2021, 5:51:33 pm] Cheryl: Let’s take it step by step
[21/06/2021, 5:51:44 pm] Cheryl: Have you paste the address I gave you?
[21/06/2021, 5:51:47 pm] Cheryl: ..
[21/06/2021, 5:53:24 pm] son: Don’t worry I got there

and a little later he got him to set up a new email account and "a live trading account with my company’s platform so you can be able to monitor your trading and also be able to make withdrawal of your profit.. I’ll coach you on everything tho okay so you don’t have to feel confused."

Interestingly on registering a trading account, my son's attempt failed so

Cheryl: I guess I’ll have to register you myself
[21/06/2021, 6:31:56 pm] son: It’s annoying
[21/06/2021, 6:32:08 pm] Cheryl: Don’t worry okay I’ve got this
[21/06/2021, 6:32:21 pm] Cheryl: Do you another email apart from the one you used on this?
[21/06/2021, 6:35:31 pm] son: No only got one email
[21/06/2021, 6:35:40 pm] Cheryl: Oh
[21/06/2021, 6:35:55 pm] Cheryl: Can you create a new email re quick
[21/06/2021, 6:40:39 pm] son: Just have
[21/06/2021, 6:40:50 pm] Cheryl: Okay send me the email

And then, once his profits were £100K+, she kept saying he needed to pay a fee/tax/pin/maintainence fee to access the funds.

The volume of messaging is staggering, pretty intense. Scary.

So the joy of bitcoin is that you can sort of track the money. Obviously the accounts are all just numbers so that's no use unless you know how to map an account back to a person.

But https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/14vKty9esTp24K1G9qXRFUAShpj36bcnnk shows the transaction history for that wallet, including a transaction on the 21st that comes to about £3K.

Note how the balance is 0, so they're immediately forwarding to other accounts.

I am hungry incidentally and accept PayPal gift.

Can I interest you in a scamwich?

I'll let myself out.

Wow.

That is really scary how quickly all that is happening.

Just looking at the timeline, 'they' knew that once they had got their teeth in, it was all going to go their way.

Scamming just seems to be getting worse by the week.

What can be done?

OP. Feel for you and your lad.

So the joy of bitcoin is that you can sort of track the money.

Unless they've been 'tumbled', a service that lets you mix your coins in with the common lot for a fee... Which they will have been, multiple times probably if Cheryl finished scam college. I'd forget trying to chase the coins and stick with hassling the bank. Is Cheryl, or Cheryl's profile picture hot by the way? Just wondering how your son got suckered into all this. Or just usual story of wanting to get rich quick?

Wow.

On a positive - if you have those chat records, and the wallet address showing similar amounts from his account appearing in wallets - a fraud team would find it very difficult to argue that your son has not been a victim of fraud and yes, they should have spotted it.

Thanks. Ross - really interesting to see the link you provided, not that I really understand but starting to get the idea.

And the chat records - we have all the WHatsapp ones and it's staggering the volume, took me a few hours just to skim through, 'she' was relentless (and good). The speed of her replies and tenacity was very impressive. Can easily see now how one can be taken in by it.

V much focused on the bank at the moment - it seems several transactions son tried to make didn't go through (no call or questions from the bank) so Cheryl asked him to lower the amount immediately and then they went through. Then he'd make multiple payments. Not sure if this helps us.

I'd definitely use that as an argument that they should have contacted you. If they were blocking a payment as it's unusual but simply splitting it up was fine, their countermeasures failed.

What barstewards.

See what comes out of the bank fraud investigation. Mine's very on top of anything unusual and won't let you contactless more than a couple of shops at a time without then having to use the pin, or get an email. It also sends warnings if anything is unusual, which you then have to approve.

Did he get any warning emails/texts from the bank - i.e. "You've just done xxx transaction, was this you ?"

Can you post a url of the scammers

I will happily spin them a yarn online via a vpn and lots of firewalls

See how many minutes i can keep them occupied, like the Microsoft help teams who ring to let me know my laptop has a virus and only they can clean it up

Microsoft help teams who ring to let me know my laptop has a virus and only they can clean it up

I sometimes try and think of a way to keep them occupied for an hour or two however my stock response is 'I only run Linux'. Stops them in their tracks 🙂

I’d definitely use that as an argument that they should have contacted you. If they were blocking a payment as it’s unusual but simply splitting it up was fine, their countermeasures failed.

This.

I set off a QI klaxon if I spend more than a couple of hundred, they totally should've noticed thousands. Also, if I were to have a transaction refused then my account would be frozen until I'd spoken with the bank. I used to consider it a right pain in the 'arris until the one time it actually was a fraudulent transaction that they'd red flagged.

Funny thing that, actually. I was away somewhere and at some point in the proceedings lost my bank card. I was travelling light so had the card stuffed in a pocket rather than it's usual place in my wallet, and with hindsight I think I must have pulled it out inadvertently along with a hotel card or something. I was on my way home the next morning, stopped at a services for coffee, paid by contactless on my phone and got an alert from the bank. My card had been used back where I was the night before, then I pinged from 20 miles away a couple of minutes later and the bank went "hang on..." Up until that point I didn't even know I'd lost it and spent the first few minutes going "of course I have my card! It's right he- oh. Ah."

Pretty clever that they flagged it based purely on geography, rerally.

I sometimes try and think of a way to keep them occupied for an hour or two however my stock response is ‘I only run Linux’. Stops them in their tracks

I've done this only not expressly told them. "Can you click on the Start button for me?" Oh, I don't have one of those...

Then he’d make multiple payments. Not sure if this helps us.

It should do, definitely a red flag to any bank upto date with anti fraud, especially if higher amounts had been attempted & stopped previously. Keep pressing the bank on this one & good luck with it all, must be horrible for your son & family.

I sometimes try and think of a way to keep them occupied for an hour or two however my stock response is ‘I only run Linux’. Stops them in their tracks

I have played along with them for a bit acting dumb - 40 mins until they gave up

Here's the lovely Cheryl(!) if anyone wants to get in touch

[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51311113331_df43f92e7a.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51311113331_df43f92e7a.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/2mbbSkM ]WhatsApp Image 2021-07-12 at 18.16.09[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/46083140@N06/ ]aus23[/url], on Flickr

[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51310367122_d0d84218d3.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/51310367122_d0d84218d3.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/2mb83w7 ]WhatsApp Image 2021-07-12 at 18.15.52[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/46083140@N06/ ]aus23[/url], on Flickr

So an update in case anyone is interested.

Bank has been really good at escalating this, treating it seriously and with empathy. However they have flatly refused to take any responsibility so the loss falls 100% on my son. I can see their point.

They have advised me to take it to the ombudsman if still unhappy. I suspect they've a watertight case.

Might be worth trying the ombudsman as it doesn't cost you anything (IIRC) and there is a chance (however small) that they side with your son.

Here’s the lovely Cheryl(!) if anyone wants to get in touch

She probably doesn't even exist and has just lifted those photos from someone else's account!

If I was a professional currency trader, I'd probably be too busy trading and making money to be harassing young people via Instagram. I'm sorry your son got duped, but this sort of thing is avoidable. The bank owes you/him nothing.

I think your only slight glimmer of hope at this point would be going to the press and try to tug on some heartstrings and shame the bank into an act of goodwill.

Take it to the ombudsman.

Him trying multiple large amounts then going for smaller amounts could and should have been picked up and flagged by their anti-fraud algorithms, that was avoidable.

Maybe ask the bank what anti fraud systems they have in place and ask specifically why they haven't got any that will flag up unusual transactions like that. Send their responses to the ombudsman/bank's Twitter account/local and national newspapers.

They should definitely have spotted this as a potential fraud.