“Every scam is driven by a desire for easy money. It’s the one thing the scammer and the scammed have in common.”
Pyramid schemes have always existed. In the 80’s and 90’s it was very fashionable to receive the typical invitation to a mattress exhibition, which turned out to be a hook to invest money in a fictitious company or buy a package of shares. Promising us in any of the cases, that we would recover the investment in a very short time, multiplied by 5, 10, 20 or even become rich. Proof of this was one of the most notorious pyramid scams known at that time; The Wolf of Wall Street. Although this story was centered in the USA, there were similar frauds in several countries around the world.
With new technologies and, especially, with the use of Artificial Intelligence to launch fraudulent information, it is estimated that financial scams have increased by 456% in recent years. So whether through false advertising of celebrities promoting investments or cryptocurrencies, or through calls or messages addressed to us by strangers, we continue to receive a multitude of information about strategies to get rich without working.
How to recognize these scams?
- Promises of very high and guaranteed profitability in a very short time: Official banking and financial institutions warn that they will never be able to guarantee a certain profitability and, much less, that we will become rich overnight.
- Downloading applications on computers and cell phones: Before installing an application, even if it is only to supposedly control the investment made, it is important that we look for information on the Internet, about whether the company to which it belongs is an official and registered financial institution.
- Request for both initial payments and personal data, without a contract that guarantees the investment: Only financial institutions that are part of the national or international banking network can intermediate in the stock and investment markets. So if we are contacted by an unknown company and already in that first contact we are asked to make a payment or provide data, we should be suspicious.
- Urgency and pressure to invest quickly: Investments against the clock in which we feel pressured and without the possibility of comparing conditions with other alternative entities are always a cause for alertness.
- Exclusivity and secrecy: The fraudsters play with the feeling of having been expressly chosen and of becoming part of an exclusive investment group, which can only be accessed by invitation from one of the members. In fact, this will be one of the strategies they will carry out, once they have gained our trust, that we ourselves invite family and friends to invest.
- Threatening reaction in case of opposition: In case we oppose from the beginning or in a post-investment way try to recover the money and stop participating, the reaction we will get will always be extremely intimidating and threatening. And even more so if they may suspect that we could alert the police authorities.
IMPORTANT NOTE: If you have the slightest suspicion of having suffered a pyramid or financial scam, do not hesitate to report it to the IT department, if it affects the labor level. And on a personal level, report it immediately to the police.
*Date of shipment: October 06, 2025