Don’t Promote If You Don’t Know: The Cryptocurrency Fairytale – Fin Tech

Cryptocurrency is definitely a risk as its intangible nature
aids unscrupulous people to carry out scams.

In 2020, a group of highly recognized Colombian influencers, -
most of them have over 4.5 million followers – Yefferson Cossio,
Mateo Carvajal, Elizabeth Loaiza, and Alejandra Serje, started
promoting a cryptocoin called Daily Cop. Allegedly, the first
Colombian cryptocurrency.

However, it was a scam that collected funds from over 200,000
people and collected over USD$25,000,000.

The influencers posted in their social networks, that they were
earning profits of 0.5% per day or 12% a month, inviting others to
invest. Now, said influencers are claiming to be victims
themselves.

The thing with influencers is, that they are responsible for
their promotions if they are not paid to promote, as they are
affecting the consumer’s decisions. As of now the Prosecutors
office is considering if they shall be criminally charged with
aiding and abetting the fraud as they should have known that their
investment was not generating the income, they claimed it was
producing,

Nonetheless, this case goes further, as the liability is not
merely as advertisers, but also criminal for aiding and abiding the
illegal collection of funds, which is a regulated activity that
requires the prior authorization from the Financial
Superintendence.

The authorities have issued a Blue Notice from INTERPOL to
collect additional information, location or activities of Juan
David Caicedo, Sebastián Betancourt, Sandra Patricia
Esquivel, Juan José Benavides and Jackeline Saavedra, who
were the creators of Daily Cop.

Consequently, influencers must be careful of what they promote,
since their saying carries an impact on the decisions of others and
their responsibility can be deeper than that of an advertiser.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general
guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought
about your specific circumstances.