Google has sued two Chinese app developers for using its Play Store to run a cryptocurrency trading scam.
In its lawsuit, the search engine giant said the alleged scammers uploaded as many as 87 fraudulent apps on the Play Store since 2019. These apps have been downloaded more than 100,000 times since at least 2019.
Users’ losses range from $100 to several thousand dollars. The lawsuit was filed at the Federal Court in New York on Thursday morning, Reuters said.
How the Scam Worked
The accused scammers—Yunfeng Sun and Hongnam Cheung from Shenzhen in Hong Kong, respectively—used “romance scam” techniques to defraud their victims. Through social engineering, they would find their victims by sending random messages and emails.
Google said the two developers’ actions breached its terms of service and violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act. It has asked the court to prevent them from committing more fraud while demanding an unspecified amount in damages.
“Keeping people safe online is core to our business and we will not tolerate the misuse of our platforms to facilitate cryptocurrency scams,” Google general counsel Halimah DeLaine Prado said in a statement. “This litigation is a critical step in holding these bad actors accountable.”
The alleged fraudsters used social media advertisements to convince investors to invest in crypto through their apps. However, they would not allow them to withdraw large amounts. Instead, they would ask the victims to invest more money to be able to withdraw.
Finally, Sun and Cheung would stop interacting with the victims and disappear with all their investments and returns.
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak recently won a legal battle against YouTube over manipulated videos using his image to promote a Bitcoin scam in 2020.