Thousands of Belgians have lost money to fake investment platforms over the past six years, amounting to €99 million, according to a De Tijd investigation published on Wednesday.
This figure only includes officially reported fraud and could be significantly higher in reality.
After months of investigation in collaboration with foreign media, De Tijd uncovered a criminal call centre in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia.
Around 85 people are active there, scamming thousands of investors across dozens of countries. Initially, victims are convinced to invest a small amount on an online platform.
Enticed by the significant profits they see in their fake portfolio, investors then transfer larger sums, often aiming to buy supposed cryptocurrencies.
However, these amounts end up in the scammers’ pockets, and the victims never see their money again.
The fraudsters then pretend to represent an official agency that can recover the money in exchange for additional deposits. Victims are thus scammed a second time, sometimes for even larger amounts than they initially lost.
The number of reports about such scams has nearly increased tenfold since the phenomenon appeared in Belgium six years ago, rising from 149 complaints in 2019 to 1,281 reports last year, according to the Financial Services and Markets Authority (FSMA).
"Scams involving fake investment platforms are now the main fraud issue we face," explained Chloé Vanheuverswyn, coordinator at the FSMA.
