punish who exactly? an ad agency that took the job or influencer that took the job or an llc registered who knows where?
they should have known better is logical, but when you write something into law it's tricky to convey the spirit. Should an ad agency do due diligence on every product they advertise, even if they understand nothing about it?
In this case, the customer doesn’t think they are covered by SEC rules because they aren’t trading in securities. The claim being that crypto isn’t a security but rather a commodity, which have fewer regulatory restrictions. However, that’s all about to be tested in court at a massive scale.
Crypto companies are absolutely securities companies, so it’s just a a matter of time until the hammer comes down. I’m often cynical about the ability of government to crack down on businesses, but in this case it really feels like a lot of crypto folks are miles out over their skis in terms of the kinds of “mind games” they think they can play on the justice system.
Why not? This will cut down on scams and dubious products dramatically, a good thing in my opinion.
Before Bitcoin there was 'secret stock trading program that can make you millions!', a few of the scammers literally changed the name from stock trading to crypto trading with the same scam.
For anyone reading you should definitely read up on how these romance scams and finance scams work.
The main thing they try to do is create an emotional connection, because once you're emotionally involved it actually overrides your brains 'logical' side of things, as in emotion is in a different part of the brain and you'll ignore blatant logical issues when you're essentially in love or the deep end. It's interesting to read about at least.
The Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security has means to enforce that kind of ban, like it has done in the past, and still does.
Banning it just ensures that law-abiding citizens can't use it for good while you solidify the market belongs to criminals. Who knows what the outcome for that will be, but if the war on drugs is any indicator, I'm not optimistic that would end up as a net positive for society.
While banning cryptocurrencies won't eliminate it, it would make it much less attractive for fraud, extortion and money laundering.
The war on drugs turned otherwise law abiding citizens into criminals. A ban on crypto wouldn't have the same effect nor would it have the effect of driving a behavior that should be treated as a mental health issue underground.
I am not sure a ban is the best solution, I am open to alternatives.
And as another pointed out, this scam involved no actual crypto.
Yes, actually.
While a complete gift card ban is possibly not necessary, I do think there is a strong need to place legal limitations on their use and transferability to reduce or eliminate the degree to which they enable scammers.
Stores have done a little bit to try to combat this at the point of sale but it isn't nearly enough.
On the telephone side, I think we need to start holding phone companies liable if a spoofed number was used in a scam. It is ridiculous that they still haven't been able to solve that issue after years of effort and legistlation.
I can only think of Matt Damon's somewhat notorious Crypto.com commercial, which has been lampooned so many times. There are others, I'm sure.