Identifying a Potential Scam
So I’m guessing that you are suspicious that you are a victim of some type of a scam. Maybe it’s an online Ponzi scheme, maybe it’s a cryptocurrency Bitcoin scheme, and you’re wondering: Am I a victim? More importantly, you’re wondering: Can I get my money back? How do I get my money back? So what we’re going to do in this reading is describe how you can identify the scam, what are the steps you can take to get recovery, and some stories about how recoveries and prosecutions have actually happened so you can see this really does happen.

Common Scam Approaches
We’re going to start out by identifying these scams. Normally, they start out as a contact from some social media platform. Maybe you were contacted through Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and it may have been just somebody who follows you and posted pictures about their life. At some point, they’re going to post a picture about how they made a lot of money, how they made a big windfall on some investment, and they’re going to try to tempt you into asking them how they made their money.

Scam Techniques and Escalation
Maybe it’s a referral. Maybe somebody referred you to an investment where you could make a big profit. Maybe it was some kind of employment that involves processing you do online, and there are different levels you pay to get higher levels of pay. Maybe it was a dating platform where a person asked you for money in a relationship with you online. Either way, it normally starts out as a small amount — $200, $500, $1,000 — an amount that makes it reasonable for you to send the money. They show you a big profit. Whatever amount you send, normally they show you it doubled in a few weeks. Then they ask you for more and keep escalating.

The Tipping Point: Asking for Your Money Back
At some point, you ask for your money back, and they tell you you have to pay taxes, an audit fee, a government fee, or some investigative fee to get your money back. If you don’t pay it, you’re going to lose all your money. They’ll make up all kinds of excuses.

Behind the Scenes of Scams
What happens behind the scenes? There’s probably some company or group of people that are rotating the conversation with you. They have a script and know exactly what to say to keep getting you to send money.

When You Stop Sending Money
At some point, you’ve determined you’re not sending any more money. Maybe it’s because you don’t have any more money. Maybe you’ve even borrowed money to put into this scheme, and you are out of money.

Recovering Lost Money
Can you get your money back? Well, here’s how an investigation goes to get money back. First, let me ask: Do you think it can happen? Here’s an article that came out today, December 30, 2024, where the largest Ponzi scheme — the largest scam that ever happened — Bernie Madoff, some of you may remember it, some of you don’t. It was a $4.3 billion scam, and that has all been distributed to more than 40,000 victims in 130 countries. This is the biggest scam in the world, and people got 94% of their money back. So it’s doable.

How Scammers Communicate
How does it happen? Three main things: First of all, you identify the scammer. How is that done? Well, every scammer has to communicate some way. It might be WhatsApp. A lot of times they transition the communications to WhatsApp. They use Facebook messaging, right? They might use text messaging, and you might think that’s anonymous, but there are IP addresses behind the scenes that they have to use.

Tracing Scammers
You can look at those IP addresses. Sometimes they’ll use a VPN, virtual private network, to try to mask the IP network. But what happens is, when you’re using a VPN, occasionally the VPN will reset or it’ll drop out, and it might instantly reveal their true IP. Even if not, that VPN has to connect somewhere, and you can use a trace route to find out the true IP of the person.

Using Open Source Intelligence
You can also use OSINT (open source intelligence) to trace the activity of that person connected to other websites. At some point, they’re going to have to do other activity on their computer besides just talking to you about the scam, and those other connections can associate them with an identity.

Investigating Assets and Third Parties
Once you’ve identified the party, then what you do is an asset search to find out what are the assets held by the person. That’s what they did in this Madoff case. They found all the assets and also looked at third parties who were involved.

Liability of Third Parties
Even if they weren’t a direct scammer, in the Madoff case, there were banks that helped Madoff hide the money by letting him open accounts too easily. The banks didn’t directly know it was a scam, but they didn’t follow their own rules in letting Bernie Madoff open these accounts. So, the banks had to pay. Sometimes advertisers have to pay, attorneys have to pay, accountants have to pay.

Reporting the Scam
If you’re a victim, first thing you want to do is make sure you stop sending money. Make sure you report it to two or three organizations: the IC3, which is a division of the FBI, your local attorney general in your state, and maybe your local law enforcement.

Seeking Professional Help
You can decide: Do you want to do your own investigation? You can click the website below, activeintel.com, to look at how you can do an investigation. We also have offerings for investigative services.

Training for Investigators
We are now becoming more focused on victim advocacy. We do presentations and training for investigators to know how to deal with these kinds of fraud victims.