Americans filed over a million internet scam complaints with the FBI last year, a 17% increase from 2024, and reported the highest losses.
President Donald Trump will use a White House event on Wednesday to spotlight his administration’s efforts against foreign criminal networks that lure Americans into fraudulent crypto investments, a White House official told Reuters.
His own family, meanwhile, is heavily involved in soliciting crypto investments.
Cabinet Officials Set to Attend Scam Event
Cybercrime prevention more broadly is the theme of the session, and the president and members of his cabinet are expected to point to the government’s seizure of fraudulent crypto investment websites, the official explained. Efforts to stop online impersonation scams are also on the agenda.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, FBI Director Kash Patel, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Attorney General Todd Blanche are expected to attend, the official added.
According to an FBI report, Americans filed more than a million complaints about internet scams last year, a 17% increase from 2024. The same report noted that Americans who filed complaints reported the highest losses.
Trump’s family has gotten heavily tied to crypto, with the president’s annual financial disclosure showing that most of the $2.2 billion he made last year came from digital currencies. This includes about $600 million from World Liberty Financial (WLFI) and $636 million more from the sale of Trump-branded meme coins.
The president defended the earnings, saying there was nothing illegal or wrong about them, even as critics like political commentator John Oliver accused him of giving investors access to the White House in exchange for them putting money into his crypto businesses. The White House has said neither the president nor his family have engaged or will engage in conflicts of interest.
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Investor Losses Tied to Family Crypto Venture
As CryptoPotato reported earlier, consumer advocacy group Public Citizen estimated that investors in crypto ventures tied to the president and his family are at least $4.7 billion underwater since 2022. Most of those losses remain unrealized, meaning investors still hold the assets and have not sold at a loss.
The TRUMP meme coin accounted for an estimated $3.2 billion of that figure, and the token has lost more than 97% of its value since hitting an all-time high of $73 in January 2025, although at the time of writing it had jumped more than 7% in 24 hours to take its price to around $1.82. WLFI investors are at least $1 billion underwater by the same estimate.
Senators Elizabeth Warren and Richard Blumenthal asked SEC Chair Paul Atkins in August to investigate the meme coin. They suggested that it may have allowed fraud or unfairly enriched people at the expense of everyday investors.
Per Public Citizen’s report, the president continues to own and control his businesses. His stakes, including the meme coin and World Liberty Financial’s two tokens, sit in a revocable trust in which he is the sole donor and beneficiary, and his eldest son is the sole trustee.
