Key Takeaways
- Small towns and cities in the U.S. are banning crypto ATMs after a surge in fraud cases.
- Vladimir Gorbunov, founder of Choise.ai, criticized the bans as a double standard to traditional finance.
- Gorbunov argues the true issue is not the ATMs themselves, but scammers exploiting human vulnerability and law enforcement’s lack of digital-age training.
Crypto ATMs are being banned and restricted across the U.S. as municipalities respond to a spike in fraud cases, particularly targeting elderly victims. But not everyone sees the measures as a justified solution.
Vladimir Gorbunov, founder of enterprise crypto ecosystem Choise.ai, has publicly slammed the bans, calling them a knee-jerk reaction and a striking double standard compared to how traditional financial fraud is treated.
Small Towns, Big Losses
The push against crypto ATMs began in small municipalities.
Gorbunov pointed to Stillwater, Minnesota — a town of just 20,000 — where police reported 31 separate fraud cases since 2023 tied to the kiosks.
Victims were often elderly, losing thousands of dollars after being tricked over the phone by scammers posing as officials.
According to a report from local publication Twin Cities, there have been $213,000 in losses from crypto scams since 2023 in Stillwater.
“Overwhelmed by the technical complexity of tracing blockchain transactions and stretched thin for resources, [police] didn’t pursue complex crypto investigations. Their solution was simpler: remove the endpoint,” Gorbunov wrote.
The Stillwater city council voted to ban the machines outright.
Straight bans spread quickly throughout, with Spokane, Washington, following suit, with a council member declaring the crypto ATMs “a favorite tool of scammers.”
In Grosse Pointe Farms, a suburb of Detroit, officials preemptively capped ATM transactions out of fear of potential fraud, despite the town not having a single crypto ATM.
A Troubling Logic
“The narrative seems airtight. A tool is used for crime; you ban the tool,” Gorbunov noted.
But he argues the logic collapses under scrutiny.
“If we ban crypto ATMs because scammers used phones to trick people into using them, why not ban phones?” he wrote.
“The telephone is the indispensable instrument for these cons, yet no one would suggest that.”
By comparison, the scale of fraud in traditional finance dwarfs that of crypto ATMs.
Gorbunov highlighted that last year, $24.3 billion was stolen globally through card fraud, including $9.37 billion in the U.S. alone.
Yet, debit cards and banks remain largely unquestioned as “inherent dangers.”
Double Standards Towards Crypto ATMs
Gorbunov argues the real issue isn’t the machines themselves, but how different financial systems are treated.
“The established, trillion-dollar legacy financial system gets to fail upward,” he wrote, with losses absorbed through insurance and customer protections.
“Crypto, the disruptive outsider, is held to a standard of perfection,” he added.
According to him, targeting crypto ATMs misses the heart of the problem.
“The problem is, and always has been, the sophisticated scammers exploiting human vulnerability and a massive gap in public understanding,” he said.
“Banning the ATM is like putting a bandage on a symptom while the disease — a lack of education and inadequate law enforcement training for the digital age — rages on.”
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Kurt Robson is a London-based reporter at CCN, specialising in the fast-moving worlds of crypto and emerging technology. He began his career covering local news in Cornwall after graduating from Falmouth University with First Class Honours in Journalism. There, he cut his teeth on everything from council meetings to missing swans.
He quickly rose through the ranks to become a frontline journalist at several of the UK’s leading national newspapers. Over the years, he has interviewed musicians and celebrities, reported from courtrooms and crime scenes, and secured multiple front-page exclusives.
Following the upheaval of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kurt shifted his focus to technology journalism—just ahead of the AI boom. With a natural curiosity and a trained eye for emerging trends, he has found a new rhythm in reporting on innovation.
At CCN, Kurt's work focuses on the cutting edge of crypto, blockchain, AI, and the evolving digital world. Drawing on his background in people-first reporting and his deep interest in disruptive tech, Kurt delivers stories that are insightful, entertaining, and human-centric.
