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Search engine Google has filed a lawsuit against two developers for distributing fake cryptocurrency-based applications on the Google Play store. The two defendants, named Yunfeng Sun and Hongnam Cheung, are accused of placing 87 fraudulent applications on Google Play over the last four years. According to the lawsuit filed on April 4th in the Southern District of New York, these fraudulent activities affected at least 100,000 individuals, with 8,700 of them residing in the United States.
Google Takes Significant Step Against Scammers
The developers created applications targeting victims by promising cryptocurrency investments. However, the lawsuit states that when victims attempted to withdraw funds, they were forced to pay fees to cover the supposed principal investments and profits. In some instances, the application demanded additional fees ranging from 10% to 30% to withdraw user funds, and sometimes these fees were never paid. The following statement was included in the lawsuit filing:
“The defendants and their associates designed the fake applications made available on Google Play to appear legitimate. They crafted user interfaces to convince victims that they held balances and were earning returns on their investments. However, these statements were false. The applications were not real trading platforms; they existed solely to take users’ money, after which the scammers would abscond with the funds.”
Google would remove one of the applications, and the developers would then conceal their identities and network infrastructures to place new applications on the Google Play store.
Noteworthy Details of the Lawsuit
The developers also used a scamming technique involving seemingly friendly connections to gain the victims’ trust and persuade them to invest in a fraudulent financial venture. Initiating conversation with wrong number messages and establishing a relationship, the developers recommended victims download an application called TionRT, which they claimed was a cryptocurrency exchange.
The scammers advised victims to use TionRT to invest and make extra income, and when they saw profits, they suggested withdrawing the money. However, victims had to pay a fee to retrieve their funds. For these and other scams, Google claims that the developers violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, committed bank fraud, and breached various policies on Google’s platforms.
