Welcome to our A16Zcrypto review, in which we investigate the now defunct domain A16Zcrypto.cc and the website that was used to be hosted on it.
On March 19, 2023, we received a complaint from a person who was recently scammed out of $210,000 in the Chinese Pig Butchering Scam.
He believes that the scammer’s website was shut down on December 7, 2022, either by Singaporean police or the FBI.
The victim, based in the USA, was contacted by a woman named Lena through LinkedIn in April, who claimed to be working for her sister in Little Rock, Arkansas. He writes:
She told me that she was from my wife’s home town, Hang Zhou, China and she loved my hometown’s food. She then taught me how to set up an account in Japanese LINE to send mails freely. After weeks, she told me that she is working for a company to update the database system of its cryptocurrency exchange plate. She and her sister made money on that plate.
“Lena” convinced the victim to invest money into a fake website called A16Zcrypto.cc/h5/#, and all of his money was transferred to Lena’s wallet instead of the fake website.
After building a rapport, Lena convinced the victim to invest in a cryptocurrency exchange platform, A16Zcrypto.cc/h5/#, promising profits and support for the Chinese Democratic Movement.
The victim transferred money from his Chase Bank account to buy coins on Coinbase, which were then sent to Lena’s wallet instead of the fake website.
When Coinbase noticed something was amiss, they shut down the victim’s account. Lena then asked the victim to open another account in Kraken, which also shut down his account.
The scammer’s wallet account is 0x281Df366c94A93ae3ca4dd0407dF3ba09e211498.
Since I was scammed, my life was ruined. I watched the fake website all the time, hoping someday it could be shut down by policemen. […]
Later I believed that their website service station is located in Singapore. The scammer mentioned to me that she had a friend in Singapore. I sent a report to the Singapore Policeman several days ago.
These notorious Chinese Pig Butchering scammers were in two groups. One group is in Singapore to maintain the website station. The other group was in the United States to search the targets to rob by social media.
They destroyed the trust of Americans and seeded the hatred among people.
We can find no popularity information or whois records for a16zcrypto.cc, however, it does have an Authority Score of 4% with 3 backlinks from 2 referring domains.
Get in touch with our affiliated Cryptocurrency Forensic Specialists at CNC Intelligence for free by filling out the form below.
Online, we also find a handful of mentions of a16zcrypto.cc.
We find that under A16z Crypto Exchange, more domains are listed, including:
- a16zcrypto.cc
- a16zcrypto.xyz
- a16zcrypto.buzz
- a16zcrypto.io
The domain a16zcrypto.xyz was registered through Lexsynergy Limited on October 27, 2021, for 2 years by Andreessen Horowitz from CA, US.
Andreessen Horowitz is also called a16z (legal name AH Capital Management, LLC). It is a private American venture capital firm founded by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz in 2009. The company invests in early-stage start-ups and established growth companies across various industries, including healthcare, consumer, cryptocurrency, gaming, fintech, education, and enterprise IT.
This is the actual website of a16zcrypto, a legitimate company.
A16zcrypto.xyz has a Semrush Authority Score of 2% with 5 backlinks from 2 referring domains.
The domain a16zcrypto.buzz was registered through NameSilo, LLC on September 11, 2022, for one year. It has a 2% Authority Score with 5 backlinks from 2 referring domains.
According to one a16zcrypto.buzz review, a16zcrypto.buzz is an unregulated investment platform. It advises against using its services due to a lack of transparency, licensing, and regulation.
A16Zcrypto.xyz Reviews
On a BitcoinTalk thread, A16zcryptos.xyz is suspected to be a scam exchange with several red flags, including a recent domain change and demanding additional deposits to enable withdrawals.
What happened to a16zcrypto.xyz?
AH Capital Management (Andreessen Horowitz) has filed a complaint against bzj bzjf over the domain names a16zcrypto.xyz and a16zcryptos.xyz, registered with NameSilo.
So crypto vs. cryptos is another variation. Can we also expect to find the following domains?
- a16zcryptos.cc – Registered through Lexsynergy Limited on November 19, 2021, for 2 years by Andreessen Horowitz from California, USA.
- a16zcryptos.buzz
- a16zcryptos.io
AH Capital Management has trademark rights in A16Z and alleges that the domain names a16zcrypto.xyz, and a16zcryptos.xyz, are confusingly similar to its trademark.
AH Capital Management’s official domain names are:
- a16zcrypto.com
- a16z.com
Additionally, it alleges that Respondent has no rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain names and that Respondent registered and used them in bad faith.
As the Respondent failed to respond, the Panel decided the administrative proceeding based on the Complainant’s undisputed representations and ordered the transfer of the domain names from the Respondent to the Complainant.
Following the Money
Recall that the scammer’s wallet account is 0x281Df366c94A93ae3ca4dd0407dF3ba09e211498.
What can we learn from that?
Experts in tracing cryptocurrency transactions can learn quite a lot.
For example, on bitcoinabuse.com, a website that maintains a database of bitcoin addresses involved in scams, frauds, and other abusive activities, we find the following report from March 14, 2022, regarding this wallet address:
Scammers are attempting to lure victims into short-term investments on discounted Diem bought against USDT. They may be working in collusion with or operating as the market at a16zcrypto.cc
And on EtherScan, we can find its transaction history:
There are 48 transactions on this address, with the latest transaction occurring 17 days ago.
The page shows the transaction hash, method, block, age, from and to addresses, value, and fee of the latest 25 transactions.
Complaints We Received
On October 25, 2023, we received the following complaint:
I have invested over $1,700,000 into the a16z crypto platform. I have made a profit from my investment. However, when I placed a withdrawal order of $500,000, a16z rejected my order, stating that their platform was undergoing maintenance. They advised me to resubmit the order. Upon resubmitting, and after waiting for about three days, a16z customer service, which is quite challenging to get in touch with, informed me that only a partial amount would be released to Gemini, my intermediary platform. They explained that this was due to the blockchain releasing funds in batches and advised me to be patient.
A week later, a16z customer service advised me that the remaining amount from my first withdrawal order was returned to my total assets due to a long interval in the release time. I’m not quite sure what this means. Lastly, a16z instructed me to make an audit deposit fee of $560,000, which is about 11.58% of my total assets, so they can verify that I am the account holder of this investment. I have already forwarded my driver’s license to them and went through a verification process with a16z. I’m questioning why this is necessary now. I have over $4.6 million in USDT still stuck on the a16z platform.
Bottom Line
“Why am I so stupid?” Asks the complainer, and he goes on answering:
Because I thought this country is the USA, a law country. Who can open a fake website to rob other people without being stopped for several months? This is a big felony. Who dares do that?
Several friends reminded me. but I did not listen. I was wrong. The Chinese Pig Butchering scammers thought they were smart and could escape from punishment.
The A16Zcrypto review sheds light on the fraudulent activities of cyber criminals who prey on innocent investors.
Sadly, despite several warnings from media outlets, investors continue to fall for scams, losing their hard-earned money.
If you have fallen victim to online scams, please comment below. If you have suffered a substantial financial loss, do not despair. We are here to assist you in recovering your funds!
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Can the victims sue the exchange platforms for not obeying the anti-money laundering? Or can she/he sue the bank which allowed him to wire the money? Can he get compensation?
If the Chinese scammers escaped to China, can the stolen money be taken with them?
If the scammers are in Singapore, can their apartment be auction sold out for compensation?
If the victims sue the exchange platform, can he also hire investigator to track his fund? If he gets some funds back, can he get compensation form the exchange platform? Double payments?
Yes, the victims can sue the exchange platforms for not obeying the anti-money laundering regulations. The victims can also sue the bank which allowed them to wire the money. The victims may be able to get compensation if they can prove that the exchange platforms and the bank were negligent in their duty to prevent money laundering.
There have been cases where victims of scams have sued exchange platforms for not obeying anti-money laundering regulations. For example, Bittrex Inc. agreed to pay over $53 million for Anti-Money Laundering and Sanctions Violations.
If the Chinese scammers escaped to China, it will be difficult to recover the stolen money. However, the victims may be able to track down the scammers and their assets through international law enforcement agencies.
If the scammers are in Singapore, their apartment can be auctioned off to compensate the victims. The victims will need to file a civil lawsuit against the scammers in order to get their money back.
If the victims sue the exchange platform, they can also hire an investigator to track down their funds. If the victims are able to recover some of their funds, they may be able to get compensation from the exchange platform. However, the victims should be aware that they may not be able to recover all of their money.
We recommend getting a free consultation with an investigation company that specializes in such cases – CNC Intelligence.
Can somebody help me to explain the scammer’s Hash IDs? I need to know which the wallet locate in which exchange platforms. I can pay you. Interested in please contact me, peterguoxj188@gmail.com
Please contact the tracing experts with CNC Intelligence for assistance. They provide free consultations.
Crypto is becoming very popular and newbies are not fully aware of the danger in it, some victims are greedy and few are unsuspecting victims who have no idea about the dangers, i read on a website on how innocent people can lose everything into crypto scam due to the anonymous way it was structured. i would advice everyone coming into crypto should try all to learn or ask before investing into the business.
Good evening. My story was published by a website-A16Zcrypto Scam: Victim Loses $210K in Pig Butchering (cyberscamreview.com). I am not sure what I can do. From this website, you said that the last transaction was 17 days ago. They even published the scammers’ Hash IDs which I believe will be useful for you to locate the scammers’ final wallets. Can you help me to freeze the scammers’ wallets? I can send you the Hash IDs I sent to the scammers. You can use it to show the exchange platforms to freeze the scammers’ wallets. Please help me. My phone is 469-388-5960.
Thanks. Regards
Sincerely
Peter
Who opened the first wallet account? Can we have him arrested? I believe he must be an illegal immigrate. Please help me. I am the person who has been the victim in this story.
Peter
Dear Peter. For optimal recovery results, please direct all questions to your case manager at CNC Intelligence.
Somebody told me that the cryptocurrency, you lost it and you lost it forever. You cannot track it back. If this is true, spending one dollar is too dear for nothing to get back. There is no one case that the lost crypto can be tracked. I hope pig butchering is excepted.
Are cryptocurrencies traceable?
I have questions about this pig butchering scam. How can the Chinese scammers come to America to open so many crypto wallet accounts? Do the exchange platforms have the responsibilities for the fraud? The scammer’s phishing website had stayed for 10 months, why didn’t authority shut it down? There are so many victims in the USA, besides the scammers, who else can the victims sue? Are there some ways for the victims to ask for help, like donations? How to start?
They do not have to come to America; they can do so from anywhere in the world, including from China using a VPN.
It’s important to note that exchange platforms typically have Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) procedures in place to prevent fraud, but scammers can still find ways to circumvent these measures. It’s possible that the phishing website was not shut down earlier because the scammers were able to conceal their location and use tactics to make it difficult for authorities to track them down.
However, it’s important for victims to report any instances of fraud to the relevant authorities, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) or the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), as this can help to prevent similar scams in the future.
As for legal action, victims may be able to sue the scammers if they are identified and located. However, it may be difficult to recover funds that were lost in the scam, and it’s important to consult with a legal professional for advice on the best course of action. Companies such as CNC Intelligence are able to trace scammed funds and assist law firms and police to recover them.
Regarding donations, there may be organizations or crowdfunding platforms that can provide assistance to victims of cryptocurrency fraud. You can search for these resources online or reach out to local community organizations for support. However, it’s important to exercise caution when seeking assistance, as scammers may also attempt to take advantage of victims who are already vulnerable with fund recovery scams.