Scammed in crypto? What to do now, step by step

In short: if you have been scammed, stop sending money immediately, move whatever is left to safety, save every piece of evidence (transaction hashes, addresses, chats) and report it to the police and to the exchange where the money went – the sooner, the better the chance that funds get frozen. Then be very careful: anyone who contacts you offering to "recover" your crypto for a fee is almost certainly a scammer too. In 2025 the FBI recorded over 10,000 such recovery-scam complaints with about 1.4 billion dollars in losses.

First, the most important sentence of this lesson: you are not stupid. You met professionals whose full-time job is to deceive people, and as you saw in this course, they also fooled big investment funds and millions of careful people. Now let's turn the panic into a checklist.

What should I do first after a crypto scam?#

1. Stop paying. No "release fee", no "tax", no "last verification deposit". Every further payment is lost too – the sunk cost will push you to "save" the money already sent, and that is exactly what the scammer relies on. You do not need to argue or explain; just stop responding.

2. Secure what is left.

• If you gave anyone your seed phrase or private key, or installed a remote-access app, treat that wallet as burned: create a brand-new wallet with a new seed phrase on a clean device and move the remaining funds there.
• If you connected your wallet to a suspicious site, revoke its token approvals – the lesson Tokens, NFTs and approvals shows how. A wallet drainer can come back for tokens it is still allowed to spend.
• Change the passwords of your exchange accounts and email, turn on app-based 2FA and remove any remote-access software. Attacks on wallets covers the common tricks.

3. Collect the evidence. Do not delete the chats, even if you want to forget the whole thing. Write down or screenshot:

• transaction hashes (TXIDs), the addresses you sent to, amounts, dates and networks
• the website addresses, app names, usernames, phone numbers and email addresses of the scammers
• the whole conversation, including the first message, and any "contracts" or screenshots they sent you
• your bank transfers or exchange purchases that funded the payments

Where do I report a crypto scam?#

Report it in two directions: to the police and to the platforms the money passed through.

Then contact the exchange the money went to (if you can see in a block explorer that it landed at a known exchange) and the exchange you sent it from. Give them the transaction hashes and your police report number. Exchanges can freeze accounts that receive stolen funds, and Tether, the issuer of the stablecoin USDT, can freeze tokens at a specific address – both usually act on a request from law enforcement, which is another reason to report quickly. Scammers move money within hours; a report filed the same day has a much better chance than one filed a month later.

Be honest with yourself about the odds: most stolen crypto is never recovered. Report anyway – it can freeze funds, it helps investigators connect cases, it may be needed for taxes or insurance, and it warns the next person.

What is a recovery scam?#

A recovery scam is the second punch. Shortly after you lose money, someone contacts you – a "law firm", a "blockchain forensics company", an "Interpol agent", sometimes even a fake FBI or IC3 employee – and promises to get your crypto back. They only need an upfront fee, a "tax" or access to your wallet first.

The FBI has repeatedly warned about fictitious law firms targeting crypto scam victims, and in its 2025 report it counted more than 10,500 recovery-scam complaints with about 1.4 billion dollars in losses. Some of these "recovery agents" are the same group that robbed you in the first place – they know exactly how much you lost and how desperate you are.

How to recognise them:

• They contacted you, often right after you posted about your loss online or reported it.
• They want money first – a fee, a deposit, "taxes" or a payment in crypto or gift cards.
• They guarantee results or claim special software that can "hack back" stolen coins.
• They name-drop authorities: "we work with the FBI", "your case was passed to us by the police".

Real police and government agencies never charge victims a fee to investigate. If someone says they can recover your crypto for an upfront payment, it is a scam – full stop.

How do I deal with it emotionally?#

Talk to someone you trust – a partner, a friend, a family member. Many victims hide the loss for weeks out of shame, and isolation is exactly what made the scam work. Telling someone breaks the spell and gives you a second pair of eyes against the recovery scammers.

Losing savings can be devastating. If you feel overwhelmed or have thoughts of hurting yourself, please reach out right now: in Czechia call the Linka první psychické pomoci at 116 123, in Spain the 024 helpline, in the US 988 – or your local emergency number.

Common myths#

• "If I pay one more fee, they will release my money." There is no last fee. Stop.
• "Reporting is pointless." Fast reports do lead to frozen funds, and every report helps connect cases.
• "A recovery company found me, so they must have access to the police files." Scammers find victims in public posts and leaked lists – and sometimes they simply are the original scammers.
• "It happened because I am naive." It happened because a professional criminal targeted you.

Where to go next#

This is the last lesson of the course. You have walked through exchanges that collapsed, coins that never were, record heists, scandals at the very top and scams that hunt you down one message at a time – and you have seen that the same few warning signs show up again and again. That is good news: you do not need to know every scam, just the pattern.

The best protection is solid basics. In Crypto custody you will learn to keep your keys and seed phrase truly safe, and Crypto basics explains how exchanges, wallets and transactions work, so that the next "amazing opportunity" looks to you exactly like what it is. Thanks for reading to the end – and stay curious, careful and unscammable.

Sources#

• FBI IC3: Fictitious law firms targeting cryptocurrency scam victims (PSA, June 2024) (opens in a new tab)
• FBI IC3: 2025 Internet Crime Report (opens in a new tab)
• FTC: Refund and recovery scams (opens in a new tab)
• INCIBE: Tu Ayuda en Ciberseguridad – helpline 017 (in Spanish) (opens in a new tab)
• ČNB: Public warnings (in Czech) (opens in a new tab)