Kidnapped for crypto: Criminals see flashy crypto owners as easy targets, and it has led to a disturbing string of violent robberies
When the kidnappers told Rocelo Lopes they had taken his wife, he didn't believe them.
"It's hard when you see someone you love is taken from you. It's really, really difficult," he said in an interview."My first thing was: 'Holy shit. What am I going to do now? I have no idea.' I was not prepared for that kind of situation." That's no different than any other sort of wealth stuff, right? You're flashy about what you have, then you're more likely to be robbed.
Lopp's list reads like a comprehensive primer to different flavors of violence across the globe. A man who was drugged by his Tinder date to induce him to give up his passwords. A 14-year-old schoolboy in Northern England whoafter bragging on social media about his crypto-trading profits.
The driver asked for his passenger's phone for"directions," and, intoxicated, the entrepreneur handed it over. But the driver kept asking for his phone pin, and the entrepreneur slowly realized he was being driven the opposite direction of his hotel. The driver then demanded more than $100 — far more than the fare — before he'd take him home.
It's not hard to find people sharing their latest crypto trades on Twitter and Instagram, bragging about their commitment to hanging on to all their crypto holdings and showing off some of the expensive, often bitcoin-branded swag they've acquired thanks to their crypto riches. "These NFTs are starting to be worth a lot of money, millions of dollars," a venture investor warned."For the most part, I don't think they're using institutional-grade custody solutions."Unlike cybersecurity threats, likeand hacking, that have become well-understood among the public, there is less thought paid to real-life assaults — in part because such physical robberies are more difficult to pull off and, consequently, much less common.
Demand for high-tech physical security gear and services is growing. Many owners of crypto rig up their homes with visible alarms and cameras. Panic rooms are not unheard of at some particularly wealthy figures' properties, according to tech workers, along with executive-protection agents — as well as sniffer dogs that have occasionally been seen patrolling the grounds at parties.
But given the ethos of fierce independence among cryptocurrency devotees, there's an inherent wariness of third-party services. A core tenet of the crypto culture is"Not your keys, not your coins." It refers to the idea that decentralized networks like bitcoin allow people to transact directly, without intermediaries. If you're relying on a bank-like service to hold the keys to your crypto, it's arguably no longer really yours.
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