CYBERSCOOP: This Bay Area Prosecutor Wants to Help Police Nationwide Take On 'Pig Butchering' Scams

The Department of Justice recently announced that it had seized $112 million in funds linked to cryptocurrency scams, including those known as “pig butchering.” These scams involve fraudsters, often posing as paramours, who con victims into sending significant amounts of cryptocurrency based on a false promise of return on investment.

The government’s cryptocurrency seizure was a win for law enforcement but just a drop in the bucket when it comes to the scale of Americans’ losses to these scams. The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center found that losses to cryptocurrency investment scams reached $2.57 billion in 2022, nearly double the previous year. Those losses were in part driven by an increase in pig butchering scams. The reports even outpaced business email compromise schemes, which previously dominated fraud reports.

It’s not just federal law enforcement that’s on the case. The scams have provided a challenge for local law enforcement, many of which may have never dealt with cryptocurrency-related cases before. As a result, some have turned desperate victims away.