Crypto scammers in the Netherlands to face up to 6 years in jail

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

The Netherlands wants to introduce harsher penalties for criminals who turn to cryptocurrency scams and digital money platforms. Under the proposed laws, being involved in a crypto scam will get you up to six years in prison.

The legislative proposal was submitted by Ferdinand Grapperhaus, the Dutch Minister for Justice and Security. According to a report by NL Times, the proposal recommends digital money scammers to serve up to six years in prison—up from the one to four years they currently face.

Suspects in other types of financial fraud, such as bank and credit card fraud, face up to six years in prison.

Grapperhaus attributed the legislative proposal to the rise in this type of crimes. Crimes involving cryptos and other digital payment platforms such as the popular Tikkie payments app have become widespread and are now affecting many more people, he stated.

Local news outlet NOS News revealed:

“For falsifying payment data, the maximum sentence is six years in prison instead of four. The maximum penalty for owning or selling falsified data is also six years. The maximum penalty for forging credit card details is from one to six years. The penalties for phishing also go to six years.”

Other than crypto, the penalty will also apply to those found guilty of owning or selling falsified data, phishing and forging credit card details.

The move by the Netherlands reflects the rise in fraud related to digital payment platforms and cryptos. As CoinGeek reported, the U.S. SEC recently busted another crypto scam which issued an ICO under the guise of a decentralized shopping profiling platform. In Brazil, police brought down a crypto scam that allegedly made off with $360 million worth of investors’ money. The scam lured more than 5,000 victims to invest, promising them huge returns on their investment. Over in Uganda, yet another crypto scam defrauded its investors of over $2.7 million with fake promises of huge profits. The investors were however shocked to find empty offices one morning, with their money gone.