Example of fraud attempt;
Credit: CSSF
The Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (CSSF) has issued a warning to the public about a notable increase in fraud attempts involving the misues of its identity.
Recently, the CSSF has been informed of several cases in which consumers who had invested in crypto-assets were contacted by scammers impersonating CSSF representatives.
The scammers mainly used the following methods to convince consumers to transfer money to them:
- Account opening or management fees: frauders claimed that after a small initial investment generated significant profits, a larger sum had to be transferred to open an operational account.
- Payment of an insurance premium: fraudsters claimed that paying an insurance premium to the CSSF was required to benefit from investment loss or theft coverage.
- Tax payments: fraudsters claimed that investment profits could only be released upon the upfront payment of a fee or tax to the CSSF or other authorities.
- Recovery scam: fraudsters targeted consumers who had previously been scammed or lost money in connection with crypto-asset investments, claiming the CSSF had recovered all or part of the lost crypto-assets or funds which would be transferred back to the victim upon the upfront payment of administrative fees or taxes to the CSSF.
As the supervisory authority of the financial sector, the CSSF emphasised that it never contacts consumers to ask for tax or fee payments or any other type of payment. Moreover, the CSSF has no competence in tax matters, it does not provide fund recovery services and it does not manage financial instruments or crypto-asset accounts on behalf of any third party.
The CSSF provided some examples (see main photo) of ongoing fraud attempts for public awareness.
The Grand Ducal Police have also warned of similar scams. More on this here.
