I think I have been scammed in a pig butchering scam

Stop all contact and stop sending money

Immediately cease all communication with the scammer and do not pay any additional fees, taxes, or charges. The FBI states: "If you feel that you are a victim of a cryptocurrency investment fraud, stop sending any money to the suspected criminals." Do not notify the suspected criminals of any intention to report, as this may compromise law enforcement's ability to investigate.

Preserve evidence before anything is deleted

The FBI's IC3 guidance specifies that the most important information to preserve is transaction details. Collect and save:

• Cryptocurrency addresses (wallet addresses used to send or receive funds)
• Amount and type of cryptocurrency (e.g., 1.02345 ether)
• Dates and times of each transaction
• Transaction ID (hash) — a long string of random letters and numbers
• All communications with the scammer: emails, texts, chat logs, and associated names, email addresses, and phone numbers
• Domain names, website addresses, or applications the scammer directed you to use
• The timeline of the scam, including how you first encountered the scammer

File a complaint with the FBI's IC3

Go to https://complaint.ic3.gov/ and file a complaint. The IC3 is the FBI's central intake for internet crime. Rapid reporting can help support the recovery of lost funds. Provide as much transaction information as possible. If you do not have transaction information, still file the report with whatever information you have. Individuals aged 60 or older can contact the National Elder Fraud Hotline at 1-833-FRAUD-11 (833-372-8311) for assistance filing an IC3 complaint.

Report to the FTC

File a report at https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/. The FTC uses reports to build enforcement cases and identify trends. If you provided the scammer with your Social Security number or other personal identifying information, go to https://www.identitytheft.gov/ for steps to limit the damage.

Contact your bank or cryptocurrency exchange

If you transferred funds from a bank account, contact your bank and report the fraudulent transfer. Ask them to reverse the wire transfer if possible. If you used a cryptocurrency exchange to send the funds, contact the exchange and tell them it was a fraudulent transaction. Ask them to reverse the transaction if possible. The FTC states: "Cryptocurrency payments typically are not reversible. Once you pay with cryptocurrency, you can usually only get your money back if the person you paid sends it back. But contact the company you used to send the money and tell them it was a fraudulent transaction."

Report to the CFTC (if the fraud involved crypto or forex trading)

File a tip at https://www.cftc.gov/complaint. The CFTC has jurisdiction over fraud involving commodity interests, including cryptocurrency and foreign exchange.

Non-US victims

• United Kingdom: Report to Report Fraud (the UK's national fraud reporting centre) via the online reporting tool at https://www.reportfraud.police.uk/ or by calling 0300 123 2040. This covers England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. If you live in Scotland, contact Police Scotland on 101.
• Australia: Contact your bank or card provider immediately to stop any further transactions. Then report the scam to Scamwatch at https://portal.scamwatch.gov.au/report-a-scam/. Scamwatch is run by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). You can also make a police report via the Australian Cyber Security Centre's ReportCyber at https://www.cyber.gov.au/report-and-recover/report.

The scam that comes next

The IC3 states on its homepage: "The IC3 does not work with any non-law enforcement entity, such as law firms or crypto services, to recuperate lost funds or investigate cases. The IC3 will never directly contact you for information or money."

The IC3's August 2023 PSA warns: "The FBI warns of an increase in cryptocurrency recovery schemes, which exploit victims who lost cryptocurrency to fraud, scams, and theft." It further states: "Private sector recovery companies cannot issue seizure orders to recover cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrency exchanges only freeze accounts based on internal processes or in response to legal process."

The FTC states: "They're the worst of the worst: scams that target people who have already lost money to a scam. If you've experienced a scam, you may be targeted by a refund or recovery scam. In these scams, someone says they can help get your money back or recover the prize or item you never got. You just need to pay them first. If you do, you'll lose more money."

The CFTC warns: "Recovery scams are a form of advance-fee fraud — when you are asked to pay upfront for the chance of getting a much bigger sum of money later. Recovery frauds target victims already harmed by other frauds."

The IC3's April 2025 PSA on scammers impersonating IC3 employees states: "The IC3 will not ask for payment to recover lost funds, nor will they refer a victim to a company requesting payment for recovering funds."

How do people realise it?

Withdrawal blocked with a tax or fee demand

When the victim is ready to withdraw their earnings, they find their account frozen. An arbitrary requirement arises — usually in the form of paying "taxes" or "fees" to unlock the funds. The FBI states: "Once the victim is ready to withdrawal all their earnings, they will find their account frozen and an arbitrary requirement will arise, usually in the form of paying 'taxes' or 'fees' to unlock their funds." The CFTC describes this as the point at which the victim is "locked out" of their account and "forced to pay more money (commonly in fake fees or 'taxes') or have your ID verified to get any of your money back."

The contact vanishes

Scamwatch (Australia) notes that if the victim stops investing or attempts to withdraw all their money, "the scammer will stop contacting you. The investment platform will no longer be available, or you may be told the investment failed."

A family member or trusted person intervenes

The FBI's Operation Level Up proactively notified 76% of victims who were unaware they were being scammed, often before the victim themselves had realised. In some cases, a family member or friend who has seen warning signs may be the first to raise the alarm.

The platform disappears

The trading website becomes inaccessible. Because the platform was fraudulent from the start, there is no customer service to contact and no legitimate entity to pursue.

Signs the scam is still running

Continued fee demands

The FBI states: "If the scammer says you can't access your account due to excuses such as tax or fee requirements, we strongly recommend that you do not pay them. Paying the scammers will not result in you recovering your funds." Each new demand — a second tax, an "account audit," an "identity verification fee" — is a sign the scam is continuing.

Contact from a "recovery" service

The FBI states: "Almost all victims, after they lost their money, are contacted by scammers conducting recovery fraud schemes. These schemes involve scammers impersonating law enforcement, private companies, and/or law firms to deceive victims into hiring their fake services or requesting payment of a fee." The IC3 warns that scammers create fake personas on social media, join groups for financial fraud victims, and represent themselves as fellow victims before recommending a supposed recovery contact.

Someone claiming to be from the IC3 or FBI offering to recover funds

The IC3 states on its homepage: "The IC3 does not work with any non-law enforcement entity, such as law firms or crypto services, to recuperate lost funds or investigate cases. The IC3 will never directly contact you for information or money."

The original scammer recontacts you

The CFTC notes that recovery fraud often involves the same criminals returning: "After fraudsters steal victims' money, they also profit from the victims' information — either by hanging onto it for a few months and coming back to run another scam or by selling it on the dark web."

Pressure to act quickly or in secret

The FBI urges victims to "Take A Beat" by resisting pressure to act quickly, noting: "One of the most common tactics these criminals employ is a false sense of urgency or isolation."

The words they use when they take the money

The FTC's refund and recovery scams article describes the language recovery scammers use, which mirrors extraction-stage language: they may call the upfront money a "retainer fee," "processing fee," "administrative charge," "tax," or "shipment and handling charge."

The CFTC's six warning signs advisory describes the sequence: "You follow their directions and make a lot of money quickly or easily. At first, you may be encouraged to withdraw some of your profits and invest more. Eventually, you are 'locked out' of your account and forced to pay more money (commonly in fake fees or 'taxes') or have your ID verified to get any of your money back."

The FTC's consumer alert on online love interests states that scammers "tell you how to send the money. Scammers want your money quickly, so they'll steer you to gift cards, payment apps like Apple Pay, CashApp, PayPal, and Zelle, money wiring companies, or even cryptocurrency."

What this scam is, in the authorities' own figures

Cryptocurrency investment fraud — which the FBI describes as "commonly known as pig butchering" — is a confidence-based scam in which criminals build a relationship with the victim before introducing a fraudulent investment opportunity in cryptocurrency. Victims are coached to invest more and more money into what appears to be an extremely profitable platform, only to be unable to withdraw their funds.

In 2024, the IC3 received 47,919 complaints categorised as investment fraud, with reported losses of $6,570,639,864 (over $6.5 billion) — the highest loss of any crime type reported to IC3 that year. These figures cover the broader investment fraud category, which includes cryptocurrency investment fraud; the IC3 does not separately publish a standalone pig-butchering loss total. As a descriptor (not a standalone crime type), the IC3 recorded 149,686 complaints involving cryptocurrency as a medium in 2024, with associated losses of $9,322,335,911. These cryptocurrency descriptor figures span multiple crime types and are not specific to pig butchering alone.

The CFTC states that "financial romance and grooming gangs stole more than $3.5 billion in 2023" in what it describes as "pig butchering" fraud. This is a category figure for romance-based investment fraud, not a standalone pig-butchering total.

The FBI's Operation Level Up, launched in January 2024, identified 4,323 victims of cryptocurrency investment fraud and found that 76% of those victims were unaware they were being scammed. As of December 2025, Operation Level Up had notified 8,103 victims, with estimated savings to victims of $511,511,288. Forty-two victims in the 2024 round were referred to an FBI victim specialist for suicide intervention.

In 2024, the IC3 reported that people over the age of 60 suffered the most losses overall, at nearly $5 billion, and submitted the greatest number of complaints. This is a figure for all internet crime reported by that age group, not specific to pig butchering.

Cryptocurrency payments are irrevocable — they cannot be reversed by third parties. The IC3 states: "transactions are irrevocable — meaning they cannot be reversed". The FTC states: "Cryptocurrency payments typically are not reversible. Once you pay with cryptocurrency, you can usually only get your money back if the person you paid sends it back."

If you are in Denmark

• Report the crime to the police at politi.dk.
• If a Danish bank account or card was involved, contact your bank through your netbank as well.

This page was last reviewed: August 9, 2026.
Drafted with AI assistance. Every figure and link on this page was checked against the official source cited for it. Not yet reviewed by a human editor.