As the crypto market rallied through 2025 — led by a strong Bitcoin (BTC) ascent that pushed prices to fresh all‑time highs in the fourth quarter — Americans also faced a sharp rise in crypto‑related scams, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) reported in its 2025 Internet Crime Report.
Rising Fraud ConcernThe Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) logged 1,008,597 complaints in 2025, an increase from 859,532 in 2024. Phishing and spoofing, extortion, and investment schemes remained the complaint categories reported most often.
Older Americans suffered disproportionately large losses. Complainants aged 60 and older reported roughly $7.7 billion in losses — a 37% rise over 2024 — reflecting persistent targeting of retirees and other seniors.
Those schemes often deploy high‑pressure tactics while leveraging fabricated social profiles, voice cloning, counterfeit identity documents, and deceptively realistic videos of public figures or victims’ relatives to persuade targets to hand over funds.
California, Texas, Florida Lead In Crypto ComplaintsBy crime type, investment schemes were the most common complaint category, with 61,559 filings. Extortion and phishing/spoofing were also prominent, with 23,797 and 7,164 complaints, respectively.
Geographically, complaints were concentrated in populous states. California led the nation with 20,878 crypto‑related complaints, followed by Texas (13,965), Florida (13,381), New York (8,088), and Pennsylvania (5,118).
The FBI also outlined its enforcement and prevention efforts. Operation Level Up, launched in 2024, has been a proactive outreach initiative to identify and notify people in the process of falling victim to cryptocurrency investment fraud.
Featured image from OpenArt, chart from TradingView.com
