Text scammers blasting out bogus job offers stole $2.2M in crypto, NY AG says: ‘Never-ending nightmare’

Text message scammers blasting out bogus job offers swindled several people out of $2.2M in crypto bucks, the New York attorney general alleged Thursday.

The lawsuit filed by Attorney General Letitia James’ office covers seven alleged victims in Queens and Nassau County, plus two from Virginia and Florida, who each lost between a few thousand dollars to more than $300,000 in the cryptocurrency-based scheme.

“I’m gonna die,” one victim said after she lost her meager savings in the scam, according to court papers.

Another victim called it a “never-ending nightmare,” the filing states.

The twisted scheme ran for at least half a year between January and June of last year — with the crooks subjecting their prey to the same playbook, regardless of where they lived, the AG’s office said.

Scammers would start by sending unsolicited text messages from spoofed numbers about great remote work opportunities with high pay and flexible hours.

Victims who responded were told the gigs required them to review products online. But first, they were told to open cryptocurrency accounts — or online wallets — and to maintain a specific balance to cover the value of the name-brand products they were set to review.

“Victims were assured that they were not buying the products, but that maintaining those account balances helped ‘legitimize’ the data they were generating,” the suit states. 

The crooks invented false companies with names like Digistore24, CultureFit Technology, FeraAI, Birdeye, Summit Digital Marketing, Diverse Staffing, Page Zero Media, Work Source Inc. and Sachs Marketing Group to represent fraudulent staffing firms, court documents claim.

“Deceiving New Yorkers looking to take on remote work and earn money to support their families is cruel and unacceptable,” said James, who filed the suit in Queens Supreme Court.

“Scammers sent text messages to New Yorkers promising them good-paying, flexible jobs only to trick them into purchasing cryptocurrency and then stealing it from them.”

Commissions were promised based on the value of the products reviewed via fake websites set up for the operation, with bogus user accounts even showing phoney earnings. 

Eventually, victims would receive a congratulatory notice that they were to conduct bulk reviews of high-priced items — implying that they would also receive hefty commissions.

Pressure to review more valuable products, and to reach supposed “withdrawal points,” pushed victims to their financial limits through credit advances, bank loans and borrowing money from friends and family, the lawsuit states.

For instance, a 39-year-old Queens man, originally from India, used his credit card to buy crypto coins and borrowed “over $12,000 from friends and family, including people from India,” according to the suit.

He lost over $58,000 — but many lost more, the AG’s office said.

A Florida woman who fell for the text trap deposited over $300,000 in just 20 days into the online wallets, the suit claims.

One Queens teacher, called “Mell” in the suit, lost over $100,000 over a seven week span, court documents allege.

As the scammers demanded he deposit thousands more of cryptocurrency for him to review more products — or in order to withdraw his phoney earnings, he eventually ran his personal bank account to a balance of negative $84, according to the suit.

Mell repeatedly told the scammers that he couldn’t give more, noting that he “could not even pay rent.”

But he received a notice that he needed to complete an additional 10 product reviews — requiring him to deposit over $100,000 in crypto coins into his online wallet — before he could withdraw any of his earnings, the suit details.

“Overcome with shock, Mell responded that he was ‘shaking,’” the suit reads, “and needed to ‘go to the E.R.’ because he was “about to die.’”

To keep his confidence, the scammers allegedly told Mell that, luckily, they were able to negotiate a deal for him, and only needed $44,000 to clear his debt.

The 31-year-old teacher, desperate to eventually withdraw his supposed earnings, took out a $30,000 bank loan and borrowed money from friends.

In total, Mell lost nearly $120,000 in the fraud, James’ office said.

Another Queens resident — a 28-year-old woman from India called “June” as a pseudonym — had her life savings of $6,250 wiped by the crooks.

After transferring the last of her money, plus a cash advance from her credit card, June begged her scammer, named Alexander, to allow her to withdraw her supposed earnings.

Instead, he asked her for another $12,000.

“June knew she could not satisfy that amount and immediately told Alexander ‘I’m gonna die,’” the lawsuit states.

“That Defendants stole all of the little money June had is the sole reason she was not defrauded further,” the lawsuit alleges.

The investigation — a joint effort between James’ office, the Queens District Attorney and the US Secret Service — identified numerous crypto wallets controlled by the scammers with stolen funds reaching nearly $2.2 million. 

Those accounts have been frozen, and the lawsuit seeks a court order to collect and return the stolen money, in addition to penalties and a permanent stop to the scammers sending unsolicited text messages in New York.

Since only the cryptocurrency wallets have been identified, those anonymous owners will be served in a novel manner, the AG’s office said, by depositing a nonfungable token (NFT) in their wallets, linking them to the pleadings.

James said that any New Yorkers who think they may have been involved in a text message scam should reach out to her office to file a complaint.