The latest reports by the FBI’s internet Crime Complaint Centre (IC3) indicate 181,565 complaints related to cryptocurrency in the year of 2025. This number shows an increase by 22% from 2024, as per the annual report released.
Crypto-linked scams dominate online crime
According to the 2025 Internet Crime Report, Crypto-linked fraud losses reached $11.366 billion out of the $20.9 billion total internet crime losses in 2025, tracked by the FBI. The report was released by the bureau’s Internet Crime Complaint Centre recently.
The IC3 reported 181,565 crypto-related complaints in 2025, with an average loss of $62,604, with as many as 18,589 victims reporting a loss of $100,000 in crypto scams.
The FBI stated that most of the scams are orchestrated by organized criminal groups in Southeast Asia. Americans over the age of 60 reported losses of $7.7 billion in 2024, over 37% from 2024. More than $100,000 was lost by approximately 12,444 complainants who were 60 years of age or older.
Styles of scams change from technical to personal perspective
Chainalysis, a crypto analytics firm released a report in January stating as much as $17 billion were lost in crypto scams and frauds. Earlier, scams were based on technical hacks, such as breaking into exchanges and wallets.
Current style of frauds witnessed according to the IC3, is where the victims are mostly falling for impersonation, crypto- exchange imposters and AI- generated scams targeting individuals.
Most of these southeast asian firms rely on the victims of human trafficking, working from secured facilities in places like Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar. U.S. ‘s newly formed U.S. Attorney’s Office District of Columbia Scam Center Strike Force, have already frozen or seized over $580 million from these networks to stop them.
Some of the recently observed patterns also showed the bad agents posing as law firms, government officials or even the FBI agent itself, extracting additional funds from victims, with almost 10,516 complaints and $1.4 billion in losses.
IC3 also reported crypto ATMs and Kiosks-based frauds to be increasing consistently with 13,460 complaints involving the machines. This led to a loss of $389 million, an increase of 23% rise in complaints from the year before.
Following these reports, a Connecticut order suspended the operating license for the Bitcoin Depot and also brought in new licensing regimes in West Virginia.
AI contributing to the rising concerns of scams
The Internet Crime Complaint Center started tracking AI-related scams separately for the first time and got over 22,000 complaints, with about $893 million lost in 2025. The fraudsters often used AI to produce deepfakes or even live selfie verification.
Investment scams accounted for $632 million of that total, and roughly $658.7 million of AI-flagged losses also involving crypto.
However, analysts stated the alarming concern is that “many victims do not realize the extent AI may be involved in scams.” AI scams remove the constraints of efforts, time or even language barriers. They no longer need to manually craft individual emails or messages or even spend hours preparing.
FBI introduces proactive strategy with Operation Level Up and Winter SHIELD
The FBI has moved beyond reactive enforcement to take a more proactive prevention model, by introducing two major initiatives outlined in its 2025 report.
Operation Level Up, launched in 2024, has been an advanced data analytics and blockchain tracing to identify potential victims before losses escalate. According to reports, monitoring suspicious wallet activity and navigating amid fraudulent networks, helped the bureau alert more than 8,000 individuals. This helped prevent scams and protect them against estimated $500 million in additional losses.
Operation Winter SHIELD was the next strategy introduced in 2026. This strategy looked into the infrastructure that enables the fraud. The initiative works on building closer coordination with cryptocurrency exchanges and internet service providers to detect and block malicious platforms in real time.
It also emphasizes public-private partnerships, providing financial institutions with tools to spot red flags associated with the famous pig butchering scams, particularly among vulnerable groups of elderly customers.
