The Crypto Detectives: Tracking Down Stolen Funds
The Perfect Scam
AARP
4.5 • 980 Ratings
🗓️ 19 September 2025
⏱️ 55 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Online criminals love cryptocurrency for many reasons – it’s anonymous, can’t be traced, and payments are irreversible. So when Paul discovers he has been targeted by a crypto scam and the thieves have stolen $450,000, he is resigned to the fact that he may never see that money again. That is, until an online search leads him to Wisconsin police detective Scott Simons. Following the trail of the stolen money, Detective Simons traces it to a private crypto wallet and eventually recovers $80,000 of Paul’s money. Detective Simons works with the non-profit Operation Shamrock to offer hope to scam victims and fight transnational organized crime.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This week on The Perfect Scam. |
| 0:05.0 | The $550,000 that the victim lost went into a particular wallet with additional funds, |
| 0:12.9 | and we were able to trace those additional funds back to other victims. |
| 0:17.5 | So we ended up seizing all $800,000. |
| 0:23.3 | And found a whole host of other victims, right? |
| 0:24.0 | Absolutely. |
| 0:26.5 | We'll say at least three dozen other victims. |
| 0:31.0 | Bare minimum, tens of millions of dollars have gone through that particular wallet. |
| 0:33.1 | Tens of millions of dollars. Wow. Welcome back to The Perfect Scam. |
| 0:41.6 | I'm your host, Bob Sullivan. |
| 0:44.7 | Not long ago, almost every perfect scam episode involved theft of money via gift cards. |
| 0:50.8 | Today, you've probably noticed, cryptocurrency seems to be the tool of choice among online thieves. |
| 0:57.4 | You might have heard that crooks like crypto because it's anonymous, can't be traced, |
| 1:02.0 | and once the transaction is submitted, it can't be reversed. Well, today's story will show you |
| 1:07.5 | that's not completely true. Thanks to the efforts of some relentless law |
| 1:12.3 | enforcement officials, crypto crimes aren't hopeless, as you'll hear. Today's story also includes |
| 1:18.7 | information that's empowering that you need to know in case you or someone you love is involved |
| 1:24.1 | in a crypto crime. To help us understand all this, we've got a couple of experts who know how to track down stolen money through cyberspace. |
| 1:32.8 | But first, Paul is here to talk about what happened to him when he was in perhaps the most vulnerable state a man can be in. |
| 1:41.5 | He was a young, single dad with three kids, and it's only four months since |
| 1:46.3 | he'd lost his wife to cancer. But I was still in a condition of kind of shock and disorientment. |
| 1:54.5 | So I was trying to get my life back. |
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