Bitcoin scam asking for donations to feed starving children exposed by Reddit sleuths

Eagle-eyed users of Reddit's r/Bitcoin community successfully exposed a scammer who was attempting to defraud members of the messageboard by requesting cryptocurrency donations that would be used to "help feed hungry children in Venezuela".

The fraudster, whose account has since been deleted, posted an image on Monday (29 January) claiming to show a group of children who had received food bought using donated bitcoin.

In reality, the picture had been "flipped" from a non-profit organisation working to provide food and medicine to the region, the Cuatro por Venezuela Foundation.

As noted by crypto.bi, Reddit detectives found that the bitcoin address linked to the request led to a gambling website. The original poster claimed this was to evade anti-crypto laws in his/her country.

One user, named as "bitsinmyblood", described the numerous discrepancies in the claim, initially posted under the profile "ZeConfusedOneAgain."

"There was a post yesterday [28 January] from a guy begging for bitcoin. He wanted to feed his starving family in Venezuela," bitsinmyblood wrote.

"Then he posted an image as 'proof' of the successful transmission of funds and the subsequent purchase of goods including food and water. The only problem is the image wasn't his.

"It was a stock image that was flipped and cropped to mislead the people who sent him money into thinking they did a good thing. Instead, they just bankrolled a scammer's gambling habits. Please, if you want to help people then you should use a charity that you've researched. There are kids out there literally dying to get your money, and they'll never see it if you send it to scammers."

Another commenter - mariodraghi - added: "So disappointing that some would really abuse the Venezuelan crisis for something like this." One early reply simply stated: "Fraud alert."

It is unknown how much money the scammer got. A Google search of the name "ZeConfusedOneAgain" showed that the con artist was highly active on bitcoin forums.

It was not the first cryptocurrency scam that surfaced this week.

On Monday, a little-known start-up called Prodeum vanished into thin air following the launch of its Initial Coin Offering (ICO), leaving investors out of pocket and spectators amused. The website of the suspected exit-scam was, for hours, displaying the word "penis."