Fake CIA Sextortionists Demand Bitcoin Under Threat Of Prosecution
A new sextortion scam campiaign is targeting victims by leveraging a fake Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) investigation. | Source:: Shutterstock
Phishing scams are the bane of a good day.
What better way to wake up than reading an email saying your credit card has been stolen? How about an email asking for bitcoin to keep you out of jail? Don’t you love phishing scams? There’s a new, particularly nasty crypto-related scam floating around, and it very well may ruin your life, quite literally, if you don’t pay attention.
Potential side effects of buying into this nonsense:
- Mandatory sex offender registration
- Loss of substantial cash flow
- Lawsuits
- Benefitting criminals
- Etc.
As you can tell by reading the side effects of their latest prescribed scam attempt, it’s not a great idea to buy-in while you can. This latest scam will accuse you of viewing, storing, and/or transmitting illicit or pornographic media of minors.
To date, this scam has earned more than 30 bitcoins in just the top 15 most reported wallets—more than $120,000 of stolen bitcoin because sextortionists impersonated government officials.
Do Not Click On The Attachment In Their Email—You Might Give Them Access To Your Computer. They Will Get You In Deep Trouble.
What Things Do They Say?
They kindly inform you that you’ve been incriminated in an investigation of a few thousand individuals across a handful of countries. They also tell you that you have a way out—Bribing a government official with bitcoin.
Oh! They even give you a (completely bogus) case number!
Listed below is an excerpt from the scam emails used previously.
“The following details are listed in the document’s attachment:
• Your personal details,
• Home address,
• Work address,
• List of relatives and their contact information.Case #49237856 is part of a large international operation set to arrest more than 2000 individuals suspected of paedophilia in 27 countries.
The data which could be used to acquire your personal information:
• Your ISP web browsing history,
• DNS queries history and connection logs,
• Deep web .onion browsing and/or connection sharing,
• Online chat-room logs,
• Social media activity log.”
These sextortionists have decided to wear the guise of national intelligence community operators. They claim to be things like a “Technical Collections (Management) Officer ” (TCO/TCMO) from the CIA. TCOs/TCMOs are responsible for sharing information with other intel agencies, talk with subject matter experts, and help solve issues with information sharing as they come up.
How To Protect Yourself
Protecting yourself is extremely easy, however. Take nothing, just ignore the garbage they’re spewing and carry on with your day. It’s easier than avoiding regular viruses and ransomware. You don’t have to do anything different—ignore them, keep your crypto locked away—and you win!
If you’d like to help further combat these malicious actors, report their email and email address to the authorities and public outlets like this one. They specialize in keeping tabs on these guys and helping alert outlets like ours so we can help raise awareness.
So, if you jump out of bed and a phisherman comes calling for free crypto, press ignore and proceed with your day.
