Consumer complaint received 2022-05-17
Company: Coinbase, Inc.
State: CA
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Mobile or digital wallet
Issue: Fraud or scam

Complaint:
I have been scammed by someone online. This scammer started by contacting me via XXXX, making me believed that she ( female base on the profile photo ) had the wrong contact info. Then she asked me to add her using telegram ( she provided me the XXXX contact ). We started talking in XXXX XXXX, and she introduced me to cryptocurrency short-term trading. She told me is it part of Coinbase and is safe to invest ( XXXX largest crypto trading site ). She said the winning success is 80 % and will walked me through the entire process if I am interested. So, I decided to try by investing {$400.00} USD. 

The short-term trading platform URL is XXXX  and was accessed via Coinbase Wallet . 

Ive never invest/traded cryptocurrency in my life, so she basically told me what to do. I followed exactly what she told me what to do ( I.e., enter qty, time interval, and either purchase long or short ). On the first trading session, I made $ XXXX XXXX and she made me feel how easy it is to make profits from short-term crypto trading. 

After the first trade session, she asked me to deposit more money to make more profits. So, I listened to her advice and put in another XXXX XXXX, then I made XXXX XXXX profits on the second trade session. Then she insisted me to deposit more and of course I did. I invested another XXXX USDT. I made XXXX XXXX profits on the XXXX trade session. These first XXXX trades were trading with the XXXX time interval ( she called it XXXX node ), which the paid out is 40 % profits. At this point, my total account assess is XXXX XXXX. 

Then she mention there will be a 60 % profits paid out for XXXX node. She said to participate, I will need to have at least XXXX XXXX total assess in the account. So she insisted me to make more deposit, which I did for another XXXX XXXX to bring the balance up to XXXX XXXX  Of course, at the end of the trade, I made XXXX XXXX. So my total assess is over XXXX XXXX  Then she mentioned there will be a super node coming up. This XXXX node paid out is 100 %. She said to participate in this, I would need to have at least XXXX XXXX in the account to participate. She explained the longer the time interval, there will be a lots of uncertainties. Therefore, we need to invest big to stabilize the trade. She said, this XXXX will probably bring me profits of XXXX USDT ( XXXX ). Of course, I listened to her advice and put in another XXXX XXXX to bring the account to XXXX as required. At the end of the XXXX trade, I made XXXX XXXX. So, my account total assess is now at XXXX XXXX. 

FYIat the end of every trade, she shared her profits with me. My profits are about XXXX less when compared to her, because her investments are much bigger. This is what she used to lure me to deposit more and money every time. She also walked me through the money withdraw process. I was able to withdraw the money ( XXXX XXXX ) when I tried it out. 

So after the XXXX trade, I decided to withdraw XXXX XXXX. After I submitted a withdraw, I got a txt via Telegram from her said that I need to keep the XXXX in the account for the next trading node. I was surprised when I got the txt from her, because I did not tell her anything about the withdrawal. So I started to suspect this whole thing is a setup. I waited a day, but the request still in review status. I decided to contact the online service ( via txt ) within the trading platform. The rep told me that I need to complete the advance authentication in order to move the money. The rep said to complete this process, I will need to deposit XXXX to verify myself, which it doesnt make any sense ( I have deposit over XXXX ). So I started to reason with the rep, and the response I got from the rep was this is the platform rule. 

After finished reasoning with the rep, I received a message from Coinbase Service and the email basically told me to finish the advance authentication. I decided to contact coinbase, since I have been told by the scammer this is part of coinbase. Coinbase said they are not affiliated with the XXXX and locked my account for security reason. At this point, I am 99 % sure this is a scam. 

So, I contacted the scammer whom lure me into this. She told she has to go through this process as well and she insisted me to complete the process. I refused to follow her advice this time, because its so obvious that she is part of this, and I was setup by her. Of course she denied everything when I confronted her. 

FYII found out that I have been scammed about a week ago.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation