Fake Uniswap, Wintermute Reps Con Californian Crypto Curious

Californian regulators have issued consumer warnings against 16 crypto broker scams, with one victim losing $14,000 to a fake Uniswap venture

article-image

solarseven/Shutterstock modified by Blockworks

share

The California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) has issued fraud alerts about phony entities posing as decentralized exchange Uniswap and crypto market maker Wintermute.

The alerts came alongside posts for 14 other registered entities apparently peddling crypto-themed Advance Fee scams.

In one instance, the victim claimed a “UniSwap LLC” lured them into investing $14,000 in what was presented as a Uniswap liquidity mining venture.

Per DFPI: “The victim met a person calling themselves ‘Heitor Ryan’ on the internet who claimed to work at a bank. They chatted as friends for several months, then Heitor lured the victim into investing on a crypto website that turned out to be a fraud.”

Another victim in a separate scam was convinced to send more than $167,000 to who they believe was crypto trading outfit Wintermute.

“The victim met someone calling herself ‘Rosalie’ on WhatsApp, who introduced him to eth-Wintermute dot net, telling the victim this would generate dividends on liquidity pools every six hours based on the amount of money put into the MetaMask app wallet,” DFPI wrote (Blockworks advises caution when interacting with the quoted domain).

Phishers and other bad actors commonly spoof popular crypto platforms to target digital asset investors. Users are advised to always triple check the domains they interact with. 

But 2022 will perhaps go down as the biggest year of crypto-related frauds in history so far, thanks in no small part to the Sam Bankman-Fried case.

Between January to November, investors lost more than $4 billion worth of crypto — a 37% jump from last year, according to a study by Privacy Affairs.


Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. Subscribe to the Empire newsletter.

Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin. Subscribe to the Forward Guidance newsletter.

Get alpha directly in your inbox with the 0xResearch newsletter — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.

The Lightspeed newsletter is all things Solana, in your inbox, every day. Subscribe to daily Solana news from Jack Kubinec and Jeff Albus.

Tags

Upcoming Events

Javits Center North | 445 11th Ave

Tues - Thurs, March 18 - 20, 2025

Blockworks’ Digital Asset Summit (DAS) will feature conversations between the builders, allocators, and legislators who will shape the trajectory of the digital asset ecosystem in the US and abroad.

recent research

Research Report Templates (1).jpg

Research

With $13B in tokenized assets, strong institutional partnerships, and a clear first-mover advantage in the RWA space. The platform's methodical approach to regulatory compliance, coupled with its hybrid public-private architecture, positions it uniquely to capture significant market share in the emerging tokenization landscape. While current fee generation primarily stems from metadata transactions, the planned launch of Figure Markets, major exchange listings, and comprehensive market-making initiatives in 2025 could serve as powerful catalysts for growth.

article-image

Perena is built on the premise that as stablecoins proliferate, liquidity could fragment, and stablecoins aren’t useful if they aren’t liquid

article-image

From hackathons to trading tools and DAO governance, AI agents are redefining how we build and innovate

article-image

CME’s large bitcoin contracts are so big that investors are turning to micro bitcoin contracts

article-image

The third-largest stablecoin is going multichain for the first time in its seven-year history

article-image

Nano Labs’ news release notes confidence in bitcoin being “a reliable store of value amidst its rising global adoption”

article-image

Several big companies report third quarter earnings this week, likely moving markets