The cryptocurrency industry provides ample room for fraudulent activities, which are often exploited by wrongdoers, as seen in the case of the fake token giveaway impersonating Elon Musk. Cryptocurrency scammers derived unexpected benefits from news of the launch of the world's most powerful new space rocket. They announced a digital asset giveaway on behalf of Elon Musk, the owner of Tesla and SpaceX. Notably, this event turned out to be a scam. This incident occurred on November 18, 2023. To participate in the cryptocurrency giveaway, users were initially asked to send tokens to donation addresses and wait for the transaction to be processed. Afterward, they were promised to receive their digital assets back into their wallets along with a 200% bonus. The scammers conducted a live broadcast using elements of social engineering. Their actions were successful, as many news outlets fell victim to the deception and posted links to fake broadcasts on their websites. The first report on the investigation of this criminal activity was made by the BitOK team. They stated that they were ready to monitor the situation and offered assistance to all those affected. This scam scheme proved challenging to detect because the fraudsters posed as the CEO of Ripple. This disguise allowed them to carry out a fraudulent token giveaway. It is important to remember that abuses in the digital currency sphere are not uncommon. According to data from the British bank Lloyds, from January to September 2023, the number of complaints related to cryptocurrency fraud increased by 23% compared to the same period in 2022.
