It has been revealed that for subscribers of the popular Ponzi scheme in the country, MMM Nigeria, who are keying in to the new trend of using virtual currency, Bitcoin for pledging help (PH), new warnings have emerged that the payments will be untraceable once made.
According to Leadership, experts revealed that bitcoin’s emergence came from the deep web where many fraudulent and unlawful transactions take place, thereby creating a means of exchange that will be untraceable to law enforcement agents.
Having resumed operations on January 13, 2017 from a one month break, MMM had encouraged its subscribers to make use of Bitcoin in other to increase their interests. However, authorites say the introduction of Bitcoin for MMM transactions was to ensure that the money put into the online Ponzi scheme cannot be traced.
Bitcoin has a decentralized mechanism for tracking who has what coins when, and preventing fraud and counterfeiting. But the transactions are recorded only as addresses, which aren’t necessarily tied to anyone’s identity, hence Bitcoin’s use for anonymous and often illegal applications.
Although, its addresses of transactions can be traced, it becomes impossible to trace once the Bitcoin is paid to another person. Accordng to the Managing Director of the Nigeria Inter Bank Settlement System (NIBSS), Ade Shonubi, MMM is luring its subscribers to using Bitcoin in other to move funds out of the official financial system.
The Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN) had last week issued a warning to all financial institutions last week telling them to distance themselves from crypto currencies as it had not licensed any financial institution to issue, trade or exchange virtual currencies.
Although the CBN, NDIC and other financial industry bodies had announced at they are looking into the new trend of virtual currencies and its possible disruptions, the CBN had made the open announcement against the use of it.
To Shonubi, “the reason they (CBN) came out loud and clear was when MMM was about to go burst and they were now offering high interest rates for people who will go digital. Because once you buy crypto currency, you cannot trace where it is going.
“It was a means to take money out in case CBN wants to start looking at who is taking the naira. They are offering people more interest and once people change from naira to crypto currency, you cannot find those guys. You can’t trace them” he stated.
