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A fake cryptocurrency company has been accused of scamming newly hired employees of thousands of dollars, according to recent alerts sent out by the Better Business Bureau (BBB).
The agency said that it has been receiving complaints since November about Cryptocurity LLC which advertised job opportunities and vowed to hire employees who have "little to no experience" to carry out cryptocurrency transactions in return for a pay of $3,000.
One of the complaints received in November involved an individual who claimed that they applied for a position that was posted on the job listing website Indeed. The individual said that the company was recruiting a Trading Assistant who would start off on a probationary period of 30 days to complete orders worth nearly $32,000.
"Applied through Indeed, they contacted me by phone, it was a foreign person, 'manager Kristy Wilk' that explained the job position in a fast manner and asked for consent, and who was difficult to understand," the unidentified individual's complaint read, according to BBB. "At the end of the call, with no further questions about my previous working experience, she told me I was going to receive a job offer and Employment agreement."
The company also asked another new employee to purchase Bitcoin as part of the employment duties, but the individual was asked to provide their social security number and bank account details for transactions upon being hired.
"My manager his name is Andrew I put his number at the top. The account number he gave me he told me to add it to my bank account and transfer money from the account he gave me to my account and when I get the money I should purchase bitcoins and send it to a bitcoin address he gave me," the individual said in a complaint sent to BBB in January.
"Now I check my account yesterday and it says my account is overdraft 20,361.67 and I don't have 20 thousand 3 months rent that I owe my landlord is gone and idk what to do," the scam victim added.
In a similar incident, another scam victim, Daniel LaSane, applied for a portfolio manager position at the company, ABC's Eyewitness News reported. LaSane said he was set to receive a salary of $3,000 at the end of a 30-days probation period and that his first assignment included receiving $4,100 in his bank account that he would use to buy bitcoin.
However, LaSane didn't buy the crypto in his name, instead, he was given a client's name to use when purchasing Bitcoin.
More assignments came in with similar instructions until he was informed days later by the bank that the transactions were all fraud and that he needed to pay back the money which totaled $10,000.
"I was kind of just rolling with the punches, felt a little weird, but it was, like all right I'm gonna get through training, and then we'll see how it goes from there," LaSane said, according to the news outlet.
The scam victims tried to contact the company via phone and email but received no response, according to Eyewitness News.
According to the BBB alerts, the company advertised having a Tampa, Florida location, but there were no records that reflect that the address is registered to the business.
"The business name Cryptocurity LLC is registered with Florida Division of Corporations, however the registered address is in Land O Lakes, FL. BBB believes that the creator of the website is fraudulently using the business name without permission," BBB said in one of its alerts.
BBB noted that scammers usually use a physical address to prove credibility but "the address usually has no connection to the scam business."
Multiple individuals have fallen victim to crypto scams over the past year. In June, a Utah man lost hundreds of thousands of dollars after he downloaded a fake crypto app that had stolen his information including his digital wallet.
Newsweek reached out to the BBB and Indeed for comment.
About the writer
Fatma Khaled is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in New York City. Her focus is reporting on U.S. politics, world ... Read more