Crypto Scams Hit $11.3B in 2025, Over Half All Cybercrime

The FBI released its 2025 Internet Crime Report in early April 2026, and the numbers are staggering. Americans who submitted complaints involving cryptocurrency reported the highest losses, with 181,565 complaints totaling more than $11 billion. That's more than half of the approximately 453,000 cyber-enabled fraud complaints, with reported losses exceeding $17.7 billion reported to the IC3 last year.

Cryptocurrency investment fraud alone drove $7.2 billion in reported losses, making it the single costliest category of internet crime in the United States.

But here's what almost no one is talking about: 77% of those victims were unaware they were being scammed until federal investigators contacted them directly.

The FBI Is Calling Victims Before They Lose Everything

Operation Level Up, established in January 2024, by FBI and USSS is an ongoing proactive initiative to identify and notify victims of cryptocurrency investment fraud. As of March 2026: (i) Operation Level Up has notified 8,935 victims of cryptocurrency investment fraud; (ii) 77% of those victims were unaware they were being scammed; (iii) the estimated savings to victims is $562,726,245 of monies they otherwise would have sent to their scammers.

That's not a typo. More than half a billion dollars intercepted before it left the country.

Some victims have reported to law enforcement that.prior to being notified by the FBI about the scam.they were in the process of liquidating their 401K, selling their home, or obtaining a sizable loan. One elderly victim living on disability had already sent $1,200 and was cutting into his food budget to send more.

In 2025 alone, the program notified 3,780 victims of crypto investment fraud and 78% of those victims were unaware they were being scammed. The FBI stopped one victim from cashing out $750,000 from his 401(k), another from selling her house to invest $500,000, and a third from taking a $400,000 loan.

And then there's this: ninety-three victims have been referred to an FBI victim specialist for suicide intervention due to the devastating nature of these scams.

Who Is Getting Hit the Hardest

The demographic breakdown is disturbing. Americans aged 60 and older lost $4.43 billion across 44,555 complaints, the highest of any age group. That's nearly twice the loss reported by the next-closest age group.

The average loss per complaint reached $62,604, reflecting what the FBI describes as the high-value nature of crypto fraud schemes. But averages don't tell the whole story. Many victims lose everything.

These aren't random victims clicking on phishing links. They're people who spent weeks or months in what they believed were genuine romantic or professional relationships. The scammers are patient. They build trust. They share fake screenshots of trading profits, photos of luxury cars, and fabricated account balances. They move the conversation to encrypted platforms like WhatsApp or WeChat to avoid detection by dating apps or social media monitors.

Then, once the victim is emotionally invested, they introduce the crypto investment opportunity.

Inside the Burma Scam Compounds: What the DOJ Unsealed in April

In late April 2026, the DOJ's Scam Center Strike Force unsealed what may be the most detailed look yet inside the industrial-scale fraud operations driving these losses.

The Scam Center Strike Force, a unit established in 2025 by the DOJ, FBI, and Secret Service to target Southeast Asian cryptocurrency-related fraud, unsealed criminal complaints against two Chinese nationals: Huang Xingshan, also known as 'Ah Zhe,' and Jiang Wen Jie, also known as 'Jiang Nan,' for managing the Shunda compound in Min Let Pan, Burma.

Investigators reviewed more than 8,000 phones and 1,500 computers seized from the Shunda compound after the Karen National Liberation Army took control of it in November 2025. What they found was a vertically integrated criminal enterprise. Teams were organized by target country. Workers were trafficked, held against their will, and forced to operate fake investment platforms and romance scams targeting Americans.

Jiang led the team targeting Americans; under his supervision, one of his subordinates defrauded a single American victim of more than $3 million using a fraudulent investment platform, a theft celebrated within the organization as a paradigm of success.

Think about that. A single victim. Three million dollars. Celebrated internally as a training example.

How the Scam Actually Works

The playbook is consistent across tens of thousands of cases reviewed by the FBI.

Contact begins via dating apps, social media, or a 'wrong number' text message. The person is attractive, successful, and interested in you. Over days or weeks, they share details about their life. They ask about yours. The relationship feels real because the scammer is investing real time.

Eventually, they mention cryptocurrency. Maybe they inherited money and started trading. Maybe an uncle taught them. They're making great returns. They offer to show you how.

You open an account on what looks like a legitimate trading platform. You transfer a small amount. The platform shows profits. You withdraw a bit to test it. It works. You invest more. The profits grow. You're hooked.

Then you try to withdraw a larger sum. Suddenly there are fees. Taxes. Verification requirements. You pay them. The platform asks for more. You borrow from family. You liquidate retirement accounts. You take out loans.

And then the scammer stops responding. The platform goes dark. Your money is gone.

In reality, all victim funds flow directly to the scammers. The platforms are fake. The profits were never real. Every dollar you sent is already moving through a chain of cryptocurrency wallets designed to obscure its trail.

The Chinese Money Laundering Networks Behind the Exits

The May 2026 CryptoTimes investigation into Operation Atlantic and the year's enforcement actions revealed something else: According to Chainalysis's January 2026 Crypto Crime Report, Chinese-language money laundering networks (CMLNs) increased their share of known illicit laundering activity to approximately 20% in 2025, processing $16.1 billion, about $44 million per day across more than 1,799 active wallets.

That's the infrastructure that makes pig butchering profitable at scale. Without fast, reliable money laundering, the scam compounds couldn't operate. The CMLNs provide the off-ramps.

And the scammers are evolving. AI is now being deployed to bypass know-your-customer verification across cryptocurrency exchanges, with specialized services using AI to generate realistic synthetic identity documents, fabricate video verification footage, and conduct live KYC interviews using deepfake technology. In other words, the fake platforms are now using fake people to pass real compliance checks.

What You Can Do Right Now

If you're reading this because someone you met online has mentioned crypto investing, stop. Do not send money. Do not open an account they recommend. Do not move the conversation to WhatsApp.

Here's what the Secret Service, FBI, and FTC say to watch for:

• Someone who moved the conversation off the original platform to WhatsApp, Telegram, or WeChat
• Claims of trading success based on inside information or family connections
• Pressure to invest quickly or promises of guaranteed returns
• Reluctance or inability to meet in person or over video (and remember, even video calls can be faked using deepfake technology in 2026)
• Instructions to use a specific trading platform you've never heard of
• Requests to send cryptocurrency directly to a wallet address they control
• Demands for fees, taxes, or verification payments before you can withdraw funds

If any of these apply, you are being scammed. It doesn't matter how real the relationship feels. It doesn't matter how legitimate the platform looks.

Stop all contact immediately. Do not send another dollar.

How to Report and What Happens Next

File a complaint with the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) as soon as possible. Include every detail you have: the scammer's name and profile, the platform where you met, screenshots of conversations, the name of the trading platform, wallet addresses, transaction hashes, dates, and amounts.

The more specific your complaint, the more useful it is to investigators. The IC3 analyzes complaints to identify patterns, trace funds, and in some cases, freeze assets before they're laundered further.

You should also report to the Federal Trade Commission. If you're 60 or older, you can call the National Elder Fraud Hotline at 833-372-8311.

Do not pay anyone who contacts you offering to recover your lost crypto for a fee. Recovery scams (impostors offering to retrieve stolen funds) added $1.4 billion in losses, often re-targeting previous victims. Real recovery does not cost money up front.

Why This Matters Beyond the Dollar Amounts

The FBI's report landed in early April. By late April, the DOJ had unsealed the Burma compound cases. In between, law enforcement froze hundreds of millions in crypto assets, seized over 500 fake investment websites, and arrested hundreds of suspects worldwide.

But the scam infrastructure is still growing. In 2025, cryptocurrency scams received at least $14 billion on-chain, a significant increase from the $9.9 billion we first reported in 2024, which reached $12 billion at our recalculation as of this writing , a number that was broadly in line with our projected $12.4B for the year. Based on historical trends, in which our annual estimates grow by an average of 24% between reporting periods, we project that the 2025 figure could exceed $17 billion as more illicit addresses are identified.

The sophistication is increasing faster than public awareness. Subjects in investment scams often use AI to enhance their conversations with potential victims allowing the scammers to quickly generate thousands of conversations that appear different to each prospective victim. Investment clubs employ AI-generated videos and voices of celebrities, CEOs, or trusted figures to create fraudulent, high-stakes opportunities.

This is no longer about a lonely person falling for a romance scam. It's about organized crime syndicates, often using trafficked labor, deploying AI at scale to automate emotional manipulation and financial fraud.

Seventy-seven percent of victims had no idea until the FBI called. That number should terrify you. Because it means the scam is good enough to fool three out of four people all the way to the end.

If someone you know is talking about a new online friend who's helping them invest in crypto, send them this article. It might save them everything.

Verified against FBI IC3 2025 Annual Report (released April 2026), DOJ Scam Center Strike Force press releases, and Chainalysis 2026 Crypto Crime Report. Last updated: June 12, 2026. Reviewed and published by the RecentScam Editorial Team on 2026-06-12.