Weaponized Memecoins & Tap2Earn Games - Russian Central Bank Warns

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Hey folks.

A public warning has been issued by the Bank of Russia stating that memecoins and tap-to-earn games are being used by bad actors to cheat people.

A report was released on Monday by the central bank of Russia presenting a rapid surge in financial scams within the first half of 2024, underlining a notable increase in fraudulent activities associated with memecoins and tap-to-earn games.

As per the document, the central bank found that in the first six months of the year 2024, more than 3,490 revealed features of Ponzi schemes representing a 43% surge compared to the same period in 2023.

Economic games like tap-to-earn, which are token-focused smartphone applications that gained popularity when Telegram founder Pavel Durov began actively promoting them, accounted for a sizable share of these Ponzi scams. The Bank of Russia stressed that scammers are exploiting "viral media trends" to entice victims, but it did not name any specific schemes.

The Bank of Russia noted,

They [scammers] leverage viral media trends for promotion, such as the hype around popular clicker games and memecoins. Over 14% of illegal projects operated in the form of economic games,”.

Across Eurasia, tap-to-earn games have seen an increase in their popularity allowing users to earn digital points with the promise of converting them into real tokens by doing simple actions like repeatedly tapping the screen.

Due to their low entry hurdles and the appeal of earning rewards with minimal effort, these games became widely popular.

This trend was spearheaded by Telegram-based Notcoin (NOT), which attracted a lot of attention with its gamified earning methods and viral marketing. Other tap-to-earn games followed, but these were mostly available on Telegram. Because of concerns about scams, a Russian senator has even asked for the restriction of these applications in Russia, specifically targeting Hamster Kombat (HMSTR).

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