Hello and welcome to The Scam Logs, where we cover scams out there on the crypto market so you can traverse it more safely. Today, we’ll cover the strange case of the SQUID crypto. Named after the smash-hit Netflix series, this cryptocurrency turned out to be a massive scam and stole tons of people’s money.
So, how did this happen and how did it work so we can better recognize future scams like this? Well, the first thing about it is the name—and how it (illegally) used the copyrighted property to draw attention. The creators claimed that the coin was made in association with rights holders and that the coins could be used for some future game. None of this was true. It seems to have entirely been a ploy to sucker people into buying it.
But that’s only partially what pulled people to SQUID. The other is, like many types of scams, the value of the coin was skyrocketing. People who put money in were seeing what seemed huge rises.
But then came the rug-pull. Investors found they could not sell their coins. They could convert them into some game token, but no matter how much money they “made,” it would never be theirs. Soon enough, thirty million dollars or so disappeared, and the culprits scrambled their tracks.
And while the irony of such a thing being tied to a fictional game where almost everyone loses is fitting, it’s a tragedy, and one likely to inspire copycats.
So, what can we learn from this? Well, the tale of SQUID points out a lot of things that can mark a coin or other cryptocurrency venture as fraudulent.
Things such as…
- Using the licensed name of a very popular IP.
- Spelling errors in the white papers.
- People can’t sell their coins after they bought them.
- The value of the coin goes up artificially fast.
- Any telltale signs of a Ponzi Scheme (which we have a whole article on HERE).
There’s likely no way now for anyone to get their money back, sadly. But I hope this will help prevent it from happening on such a big scale next time. Scammers will almost assuredly try this trick again, but people will hopefully be warier. And, for readers of The Scam Logs, you’ll know the danger signs and can avoid them before they even steal a cent of your money.
