Nigeria just sent home over 100 foreign criminals who were running fake cryptocurrency romance scams in the country. The group included 60 people from China and 39 from the Philippines, all convicted of what officials call cyber-terrorism and internet fraud.
These scammers had a pretty clever but nasty trick. They would pretend to fall in love with people online, then convince their victims to put money into fake crypto investments. Once the money was sent, it just disappeared, and the romance turned out to be completely fake too.
The country’s anticorruption agency announced the deportations on Thursday, saying they’re really cracking down on these online scam operations now. They’ve actually deported even more people since mid-August, including another 39 Filipinos and 10 more Chinese nationals.
All these deportees were part of a huge bust that happened back in December. Police arrested 792 suspected cybercriminals in just one operation in Lagos, which is pretty impressive when you think about it. At least 192 of those arrested weren’t even Nigerian citizens.
Nigeria has been dealing with internet scammers for years now. Locals even have a nickname for them—” Yahoo Boys .” The problem is that foreign criminal groups have been setting up shop there because the cybersecurity systems aren’t as strong as other countries.
Conclusion
Nigeria is getting serious about fighting online scams by kicking out foreign criminals. This shows how romance crypto scams are becoming a worldwide problem that needs tough action.
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