The internet is full of scammers trying to scam unsuspecting people out of their money.But pretending to be a scam Elon Musk and his group of tech companies—including Tesla, space exploration technologies corp., neural linkand X— has surged in popularity in recent years. Gizmodo obtained reports of many of these scams filed with the federal government over the past year.
Gizmodo filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to complain about a scam using the name of Musk and his company to trick internet users into handing over their funds. The FTC found thousands of complaints filed since January 2023 but only released 200 to Gizmodo.
These complaints have been redacted by the FTC, preventing Gizmodo from independently verifying each scam, but they provide a window into how often this type of scam is used and the types of tactics scammers employ. For example, Tesla will hold Cybertruck launch conference at the end of 2023 Seems like a good time for scammers to take advantage.
Some complaints are confusing and written in loose phrases that do nothing to tell the story, such as the full text of the complaint: “Elon Musk fan page membership card to meet him in person, I can visit Space X and give away Membership a gift.” Aside from the confusing syntax, you can see the general outline of what happened there, but there’s simply no further information in the complaint about what happened and whether any money was lost.
But other complaints can give you an idea of what’s actually going on and how much money is being passed on to scammers. In one particularly heartbreaking story, a woman filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) after her 72-year-old husband, who has dementia, gave money to scammers posing as people associated with electric car company Tesla .
The following complaint has been lightly edited just to make it easier to read, but any spelling errors and strange grammar are in the original document. Access to any of the following web domains is at your own risk. They are clearly scams posing as legitimate websites related to Musk and his companies, and you should not give them money.
Loss $18,880 – Pennington, NJ
Yesterday, 11/30/23, during the Tesla Cybertruck online event, a scam impersonating Elon Musk appeared on Tesla-clubs.com. They sent a QR code with an encrypted address, which appears to be part of the campaign. They demand that cryptocurrencies be sent so that more people can use cryptocurrencies and make the world a better place. correct. Falling for it.
I wanted to participate and sent 0.5 Bitcoin to the following address: [redacted]
When I received the transaction confirmation I quickly realized it was a scam as it had spelling errors.
I tried contacting the Coinbase helpline but they don’t have a phone number where I can talk to someone. They only have an automated chatbot, which doesn’t help.
Can you help me get my money back? What else should I do?
Thank you so much!
Loss $1,500 – Schenectady, NY
My husband, [name redacted]72 years old, diagnosed with FTD (frontotemporal disorder) dementia.
According to his statement, he learned from Facebook that Tesla (Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk) was experiencing financial difficulties and asked for help to purchase a car more cheaply in the future. He was then instructed to purchase 15 $100 Apple gift cards, scratch off the code on the back of the card, and then forward the code to ??? (via email/text call I don’t know).
I found 14 of the 15 gift cards at home and called 1-800-275-2273 (support.apple.com/giftcard) and found the balance was zero. Additionally, I searched Google, Apple gift cards, and found that there are many more people who have suffered terrible scams. Considering FACEBOOK is one of the most popular websites, we would be grateful if the FTC could investigate this case and help prevent more people from being scammed. Of course I would be grateful if my husband would return the money. I can provide images of the cards if needed.
If you have any questions, you can contact me by phone: [redacted]
Loss $12,519 – Concord, NC
When I searched on the internet and found the website https:tesla-clubs.com on November 30th at the Tesla Cybertruck live event at 3pm ET, I also saw a Crypto Giveaway about the website YouTube promotional video “Send your DOGE to the X2 return address.” I moved my Doge Crypto to this address [redacted]; I was scammed as part of a cryptocurrency scam on the https:tesla-clubs.com website. I originally planned to test a small amount of cryptocurrency first, but while using my ledger wallet, I inadvertently transferred all of my doge cryptocurrency, approximately $13,000.
Loss $1,500 – St. Petersburg, FL
The man sent me the first page of Elon Musk’s passport. Looks legit. Let me open an account with Trust Wallet. A Bitcoin trading platform. It shows that the deposit is nearly 600,000. I ended up needing to pay a $1500 fee to get the money on the account.
Loss USD 4,300 – Abu Dhabi
I met a man named [redacted] (OKC) on Telegram and a few days later we started chatting on WhatsApp and then [redacted] Shared screenshots of crypto profits with me and told me that I could also invest, and then I asked [redacted] About the company, [redacted] Tell spacestockmining.com is Elon Musk’s company and is regulated by the government.
I then visited the Space Stock Mininig website and selected the registration option. Then the website interface opened SpaceX, I gained confidence, and then I invested 1,500 USDT. 4 days after I invested 1500 USDT, profits started appearing on spacestockmining.com. Then a few days later I made a withdrawal request with my profit of 3000 USDT and then I told the support team on chat why my withdrawal did not go through and the support team said that your system sync process is still pending and for that you have to deposit 1050 USDT Spacestockmining.com, as the support team chat said, I did it, then I received the mail, which said that my sync process failed because 1050 USDT was not enough, in order to complete my sync process, I deposited 1100 USDT completes the synchronization process.
Then my email synchronization process was successful, but the email said that my KYC documents are waiting to be processed, and for the KYC process, I have to deposit 650 USDT, and my profit withdrawal will be processed immediately, then after a few days, I deposited 650 USDT , my KYC email was completed and in that email I also got my Whatsapp mobile number [redacted] Payment operator, then I chat with the payment operator [redacted] On Whatsapp, the payment operator said that to withdraw my profit of 3000 USDT, I have to buy a Swift link code, which costs 1000 USDT. Then I realized it was probably a fraud.
Loss $700 – Makawa, Hawaii
Hello, I saw an ad for a Bitcoin website on TikTok. This particular addition seemed to be promoted by Elon Musk, who said that for those who opened an account, you would receive 0.3 Bitcoin (about $10,000 at the time). So I created an account and deposited $500 in Bitcoin. When I try to withdraw funds they say I need to deposit more funds to unlock the withdrawal feature? The website is Koledex.com.
Loss $6,700 – Houston, Texas
I joined a trading group supposedly to train an AI robot designed by Elon Musk. They provide us with signals on which coins to trade, when to enter and when to exit. gentlemen. [redacted] Send signals and train. The content in my previous forex and high frequency trading matches what I know and is very detailed. We have a chat group on WhatsApp where people can show their profits from trading and even transfer funds to the GCX app. Coming from a finance background seemed strange to me. They gave everyone who provided identification $30 to start the transaction. The system will change your leverage to farm your money. I asked a friend to get into the app and share the signal with him. When he tried to withdraw funds, he kept being rejected due to anomalies in his wallet address. He tried some previously used platforms such as Coinbase, kracken, cashapp and crypto.com. When none of that worked we tried an internal transfer and they said that was wrong as well. I did nothing wrong when I saved my money. The answer after your money is taken away is to save more money. I will help you. I looked for the most traded coins or contracts, but couldn’t find most of them. The ones I can get don’t have the same price. For example GMEUSDT, we are trading at around $300, but on another platform it is only 0.0000019. I uploaded all the group chat information and information about his assistant. [redacted]. She said they were located in New York. Here is the website of the app or one of the ones I found https: www.gcxcrypto.coh5
$250 – Quebec, Canada
Link to Elon Musk’s online video. His company develops artificial intelligence investing software (Quantum AI) for Canadians. I sent money to them online via PayPal. Multiple calls and emails. I realized too late and did not respond to any further communications.
$145 – Flat Rock, MI
I saw an ad on TikTok about Elon Musk offering a 0.23 BTC referral code to the mitelex.com website to get started. I tried it and it added the money to the wallet, but to withdraw the funds you need to deposit 0.00306 BTC to verify the wallet in order to withdraw the funds. I deposited $145 which is $0.0032 but it did not verify the wallet. They say it has to be the exact amount to unlock your wallet to withdraw funds. So, I lost $145 on this. I just hope no one else gets caught doing this.
$13,500 – Taipei, Taiwan
TLDR This website claims they will pay more if I send Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies to their address.
The index page (index.html, https:tesla-prize-x.com) shows a fake media website claiming that Elon Musk will give away free cryptocurrency for a limited time. If we click on the links on this page, most of the links lead to legitimate Medium sites. Scammers use this method to trick users into thinking that everything on the website is genuine.
Furthermore, if we click on the link labeled Click Here – Get BTC, it takes us to a page with a giant X (company) logo claiming that we need to send Bitcoin to a specific address in order to get paid.
What’s more, at the bottom of the page, there appears to be a real-time trading leaderboard. If we open the developer tools (Ctrl Shift I), there is no ongoing WebSocketHTTP-fetch session, which proves that the data from the leaderboard is randomly generated via Javascript.
Lost $0 – City Unknown
Fill out the Facebook form to win a Tesla giveaway from Elon Musk.
Complete the form including name, address, phone number, email address.
Two days later I was told to send $200 to sign up. I didn’t send the money and sent an email and text message a few days later asking for $500. I have yet to send money by pretending to be Elon Musk. The number dialed has been blocked.
I am of advanced age and fear for my safety now that I have given out my personal information
Loss of USD 1,000 – Nagpur, India
She assured me that she would return the money I lost and also talked about managing Elon Musk’s account. She also took $700 to $1000 from me under some pretext by telling me emotional things and pretending to be in love with me and said don’t talk to me now and also blocked all messages. number.
$0 – Redmond, OR
A video was discovered on 9gag of Elon Musk running a Bitcoin giveaway on a website called livebitx.com. You go there, create an account and enter the promo code “ELON65”. After that it will give you 0.29 Bitcoin, but your account is not verified yet and you can’t do anything with it until you deposit 0.005 Bitcoin into your account. I didn’t do it. But I thought I should tell you about it.
If you see anything on social media that claims you need to send someone money (whether it’s cryptocurrency or gift cards) to unlock or make money, it’s definitely a scam. Guys, be careful out there.Especially as cryptocurrency prices climb to levels we’ve never seen before more than two years. FOMO is one hell of a drug.