FILE - An advertisement of Bitcoin, one of the cryptocurrencies, is displayed on a building in Hong Kong, on Nov. 18, 2021. A district attorney from New York said Thursday that his unit of cryptocurrency investigators disrupted a "pig butchering" operation that defrauded people across the U.S. out of millions of dollars.
These bogus investments show "tremendous returns" but when the victim tries to withdraw big sums, they're locked out of the account and lose the investment, Brooklyn District Attorney Eric GonzalezGonzalez established the Virtual Currency Unit in 2023 after he said he received many complaints from Brooklyn residents who were swindled out of money from "pig butchering.
The VCU unit analyzed crypto transactions and domain registry records which led to the discovery of more victims and a network of around 80 domains linked to the scheme. The combined loss between the victims is estimated to be over $1 million.