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- Saskatoon police have debuted a poster campaign against Bitcoin scams in the city.
- Fraudsters have been faking calls to deceive victims that they are government agencies.
Bitcoin scams have been on the rise for years. The largest cryptocurrency is usually preferred by scammers as a means of payment, probably due to its level of anonymity in transactions. In order to protect the public, the law enforcement authority in Saskatoon is launching a new campaign to educate its residents to avoid fraudulent activities related to digital currencies.
Saskatoon police launch campaign to mitigate Bitcoin scams
Saskatoon is the biggest city in the province of Saskatchewan, Canada. According to the report today by CBC, the local police are poised to combat Bitcoin scams in the region. To achieve this, the police have launched a city-wide new poster campaign aimed at educating the masses about fraud prevention.
Most cryptocurrencies, especially Bitcoin, do not have any centralized party, and it is neither regulated by central banks nor the government. As part of the Bitcoin scam strategy, the fraudsters usually fake calls to targets in order to look legitimate. Victims are threatened with tax debts or immigration issues and will be asked to pay a certain amount of money to the scammers’ Bitcoin address.
Scammers fake calls
According to the Saskatoon police, the victims are usually asked by the Bitcoin scammers to transfer the funds through Bitcoin ATMs. Due to the lack of awareness, most of the victims easily fell for the tricks, which is what the local police are fighting to curb. In one of the posters, the police informed that government agencies wouldn’t ask or request payments via Bitcoin.
Government agencies such as the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IIRC), the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), or other police services in Canada, or any lawyers representing the above agencies, will never ask for payment in Bitcoin, the poster reads.
The posters have been dispatched to Bitcoin ATMs in the city, according to the police.
