U.S. Attorney Gerard M. Karam Announces Fraud Alert For Covid-19 Cryptocurrency Scam

Summary

The United States Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania alerts the public to a nationwide scam to trick unsuspecting individuals into paying cryptocurrency to lift non-existent arrest warrants. According to Karam, targets have received forged court documentation stating they are being investigated for Payroll Protection Program (PPP) fraud and are the subject of an arrest warrant. The documents often claim to have been sent on behalf of the Department of Justice's Civil Division's Commercial Litigation Branch and tell the recipient to pay through a cryptocurrency kiosk. The office states that these solicitations are unapproved and illegitimate and that recipients should not respond or follow the instructions. The release directs reports to the National Center for Disaster Fraud Hotline.

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Full text

SCRANTON - The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania is alerting the public about a nationwide scam to trick unsuspecting individuals into paying cryptocurrency to lift non-existent arrest warrants.
According to United States Attorney Gerard M. Karam, targets of the scam have received forged court documentation stating that they are being investigated for Payroll Protection Program (PPP) fraud and are the subject of an arrest warrant.  The documents often claim to have been sent on behalf of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division’s Commercial Litigation Branch.  Additional documents sent by scammers advise the recipient that to lift the arrest warrant, the recipient must make a payment through a cryptocurrency kiosk.  The documents contain detailed instructions on how to use a cryptocurrency kiosk to send payment.
The United States Attorney’s Office is warning the public that these solicitations are unapproved and illegitimate.  If you receive solicitations to lift an arrest warrant in exchange for cryptocurrency payments, you should not respond or follow those instructions.  Please report these scams to law enforcement by calling the Department of Justice’s National Center for Disaster Fraud (NCDF) Hotline at 866-720-5721, or by submission to the NCDF Web Complaint Form at:
https://www.justice.gov/disaster-fraud/ncdf-disaster-complaint-form
.  You also may report the scam to the Federal Bureau of Investigation at:
https://www.ic3.gov/
.
On May 17, 2021, the Attorney General established the COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force to marshal the resources of the Department of Justice in partnership with agencies across government to enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud. The Task Force bolsters efforts to investigate and prosecute the most culpable domestic and international criminal actors and assists agencies tasked with administering relief programs to prevent fraud by, among other methods, augmenting and incorporating existing coordination mechanisms, identifying resources and techniques to uncover fraudulent actors and their schemes, and sharing and harnessing information and insights gained from prior enforcement efforts. For more information on the Department’s response to the pandemic, please visit
https://www.justice.gov/coronavirus
.
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NOTE: This press release has been updated to reflect the removal of the names of uncharged entities.

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