How a simple work-from-home task led to an online scam

A viral online scam is targeting people looking for work-from-home opportunities, leading to major financial losses.

One such victim, a 37-year-old man from Delhi, India was tricked into investing millions in a fake trading app after falling for a viral work-from-home scheme. He ended up losing nearly INR1.1 million.

The scam began when the man received a WhatsApp message on January 20, offering easy work-from-home tasks for money.

After completing a simple task, he was added to a social media group and given a special code to send to an ID with a woman’s username.

She helped him get his first settlement of INR150, building his trust in the scheme. The victim was then introduced to more work-from-home tasks that promised bigger returns.

Soon, the scammers introduced “prepaid tasks” where he had to pay upfront and receive a refund with a 30 percent commission. He paid INR1,000 at first, and after receiving his refund with profit, he felt confident and began investing larger amounts.

As the online scam continued, the scammers kept demanding more money. One day, when the victim asked to withdraw his money, they refused.

They pressured him to complete one last task, which required a INR0.2 million payment. Even after paying that amount, they kept asking for more.

It was only when the victim realized he had been scammed out of INR1.1 million that he filed a police complaint.

Earlier, a viral cryptocurrency scam rocked Kuwait, with around 40 million Kuwaiti dinars ($130 million) vanishing in just hours.

The fraud, one of the largest in the country’s digital history, followed the sudden collapse of a new cryptocurrency called “Bitcoin Kuwait.”

Young and inexperienced investors, who had heavily invested in this new asset, were left stunned when the coin collapsed shortly after launch.

The scheme, which allegedly spanned three years, was uncovered by Dr. Safaa Zaman, a computer science professor at Kuwait University.

She shared her findings in a viral post on social media platform X, revealing that the creator of “Bitcoin Kuwait” had vanished with the funds.

Despite the Ministry of Commerce and Industry’s refusal to license Bitcoin trading, there are no effective safeguards to protect the public from such scams.

Dr. Zaman pointed out that young traders, many of whom lack financial literacy, are especially vulnerable to such schemes.

She found that nearly 60 percent of cryptocurrency traders in Kuwait are young people and gambling enthusiasts, making them easy targets for fraud.