Now is the time to be your best advocate. Use these five steps to report the crime and help others from being victimized.

Take a deep breath.

You have been the target of highly sophisticated, transnational criminal organizations. These criminals invest millions of dollars devising ways to trick you into sending them money.

They create fake personas, employ people to connect with you, and build up fraudulent crypto websites. They use sophisticated psychological strategies to deceive people like you into moving your life savings into cryptocurrency investment platforms that look real, but are entirely fake. And they’re good at it.

It’s natural to feel embarrassed, upset, and humiliated. But now is the time to hold your head high and be your best advocate. There are five concrete steps you can take:

1. Collect your evidence

The police and other agencies will need specific information about the money transfer to search for your stolen funds. Make sure you bring any receipts or screenshots of the transactions.

Be sure your records include dates, times, and online addresses, if possible.
Capture the transaction hash (a mix of letters and numbers that identifies your specific individual transaction) and a deposit address (a mix of letters and numbers that shows the blockchain address to which you sent the funds) so they can trace your cryptocurrency.
Keep these details handy, as many agencies will request this information.

Get more details in the FBI guidance.

2. File a complaint

Go to the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) and click on "file a complaint.” Do not expect to hear back directly. It’s important to report the scam to the IC3 so the government can track the size of the problem to put appropriate resources toward fighting it. Additionally, you want the FBI to have a record of your claim in the event there is an asset recovery.

3. Contact local law enforcement.

Connect with your local police and law enforcement agencies as soon as possible.

Ask to speak to a financial crimes detective.
Make sure that your local agencies understand the crime is happening in their jurisdiction.

We’ve found that many local agencies are still unfamiliar with crimes like pig butchering and may tell you that it’s a civil case. If so, encourage them to watch “Pig Butchering Scams” from Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.

4. Report to the Operation Shamrock Chainabuse.com portal.

Using the portal to provide information about your case will help private industry connect the fraudulent deposit addresses to the public sector in the hopes that your assets can be frozen quickly to prevent the criminals from accessing your funds.

The Operation Shamrock triage team will evaluate all cases submitted through the portal and identify whether there is an opportunity to recover funds. If so, our trained investigators will immediately work to pursue recovery for you.

We’ll also add the scammers’ data to the growing database of social media handles, mobile phone numbers, URLs, and cryptocurrency addresses that the criminals are using so that law enforcement can connect more cases.

5. Give yourself grace.

You’re understandably in pain and feel exhausted. Let yourself rest and regroup. When you’re ready, we strongly encourage you and your family members to reach out to any of our trauma-informed victim resource partners.

To learn how these criminals operate, read about the pig butchering life cycle.

Read about victims’ personal experiences in our Survivor Stories blog.

Five Steps to Take if You’re a Scam Victim