Alabama women lose $152,000 as crypto fraud targets Trump supporters

Less than two months after President Donald Trump took office, fraudsters began targeting supporters who helped the US president’s campaign. Many of these fraudulent schemes are aimed at supporters who have purchased mementos to support Republican candidates in presidential bidding.

When Donald Trump said he would run for president again, it seemed like a long shot in the aftermath of his loss in 2020.

Trump’s campaign has kicked out a large number of memorabilia, particularly to raise money his supporters bought in baggage.

The commemorative strategy worked. The campaign’s funding quickly filled up. However, those who purchased the various items have found themselves targeted by the malicious actors who told them that when Trump becomes president, value is a growing investment.

It’s been more than a month since Trump was sworn in, and many of those people are now discovering that such a promise is a scam.

President Donald Trump has promoted his “Save America” ​​book to his supporters as the only book that “captures our movements, our campaigns and our future.” Source: Donald Trump (X/Twitter)

How fraud works

According to Jake Moore, global cybersecurity advisor at ESET, these scams work well because they misuse psychological triggers.

Consider this Alabama woman’s case. He found himself browsing various Trump supporters groups on Telegram soon after the election. That was when she realized that members were referring to plans that people could be paid just to own memento.

The woman was interested in buying coins and other Trump memorabilia and making some quick money, so she reached out to a telegram account promoting the scheme.

They informed her that she would qualify for a $13 million rebate if she could provide a photo of the product. To argue that, all she had to do was pay a transaction fee of just over $152,000 to be sent in cryptocurrency.

According to Forbes, the money went directly into the scammer’s crypto wallet, but the woman never got $13 million. Scams have been around since the early 2020s, and this latest stunt is just a variation.

The scam is called the Trump Rebate Banking (TRB) scheme, and the fraudster promises not only that coins, bills and other president-themed financial products will help win elections, but also worth a large sum after he takes office.

Those who fell for fraud usually lost thousands as the victims scamed only their initial investments, making Alabama women one of the most prolific instances.

The victim, Alabama woman, contacted Lincoln police after she was not rebate. Luckily, she was able to get her money back as the FBI had frozen funds that had been stolen in November, and they remained in federal custody.

More scams targeting Trump fans

The public is slowly being sensitized to these scams, but there are still plenty of scams targeting Trump fans across major online platforms.

Forbes has identified several Telegram accounts that promise to help people make money from Trump-related items. Many were also found on X, a platform owned by Trump’s ally and Department of Government Eron Musk (DOGE).

The scammer offers to help people seek to cash out Trump-themed products. Others claim they will help people who have been scammed. The growing conditions of their victims are increasingly vocal on X.

“I don’t want (people) to create or sell scams using President Trump’s name,” another user who wrote in a thread last month reportedly spent up to $40,000 on Trump’s products.

Users later realized it was a scam account due to the stranger posts. “You can get cash out right now,” the TRB-themed X account links to Telegram users’ offerings to make money from Trump memorabilia.

X has yet to comment on the issue, but when Telegram responded to the subject, its spokesman, Remi Vaughn, reiterated his commitment to keeping fraud away from the platform.

“Every day, moderators remove millions of harmful content from Telegram, including fraud,” Vaughn said. I said.

Additionally, Jake Moore, a global cybersecurity advisor for security company ESET, urges users to do due diligence on accounts or groups that promote such offers before joining. As mentioned before, he believes these scams work, so they are misusing psychological triggers that make people vulnerable to minor manipulation.

“And more, as many Trump supporters are deeply invested in his brand and remain behind him politically and even financially, the idea that their memorabilia is consistent with his belief in his power makes them more likely to fall into it,” Moore added.

Of course, the only time the Trump team left to give back to supporters who purchased the memorial was when they organized an air facility for the president’s official meme token, the $3 Trump token, for the memorial buyers.

Those who could claim airdrops, those who purchased the card items had the same level of value capped for everyone, regardless of how much they spent on the purchase.