At least 2% of total bitcoin stolen by fraudsters in India

According to an IANS report, 100,000 victims have lost more than 1 trillion rupees in the GainBitcoin scam — with the number of victims and the amount of losses continually rising.

According to Indian journalists, police were able to trace 60,000 user IDs and email addresses and determine that the mastermind Amit Bhardwaj (who died this year) received between 385,000 and 600,000 BTC.

The fraud was based on a Ponzi scheme, where senior investors were paid with funds received from new investors. Such a pyramid scheme could work for quite a long time, until investors who were the last to believe in the scheme began to worry about where their investments and profits were. The Ponzi scheme has been popular among cryptocurrency fraudsters for several years now, and prosecutors are currently investigating whether the Terra-based decentralized financial platform Anchor Protocol can be defined as a Ponzi scheme. Many investors are now ready to appear in court and provide evidence.