John McAfee charged with fraud over alleged cryptocurrency scheme

[Jet_ski]

Summary

[Former?] Technology pioneer John McAfee has been charged with conspiracy to commit fraud and money laundering in deceptive schemes to promote cryptocurrencies, federal prosecutors announced Friday.

 

In a newly unsealed indictment, the Justice Department alleged that McAfee and his business associate Jimmy Watson used McAfee’s Twitter account to tout various cryptocurrencies to hundreds of thousands of followers, all while concealing from potential investors how they stood to gain from a run-up in prices. They allege it was a “pump and dump” scheme.

 

McAfee and Watson first bought large quantities of lesser known cryptocurrencies at low prices, according to the indictment. Then, they promoted those same digital tokens on Twitter, in an attempt to inflate their prices, using false and misleading endorsements — including deceptively telling potential investors that they would disclose whether they owned the cryptocurrencies that they were recommending. But these were false assurances, prosecutors claim — next came the “dump.”

 

There are also charges involving fundraising events called “initial coin offerings.” In alleged violation of securities laws, McAfee and Watson endorsed ICOs while concealing from investors that they were in fact getting paid for promotional tweets.

 

In one tweet dated Dec. 20, 2017, McAfee responds to another user who asks whether he gets paid to promote an ICO. “I do not,” McAfee says. But he was in fact receiving compensation for boosting the ICO through his Twitter account.

 

Quotes

Quote

Prosecutors alleged that McAfee, Watson and other members of McAfee’s cryptocurrency team took in more than $13 million by victimizing investors who had bought into a fraudulent scheme.

 

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From about December 2017 to February 2018, McAfee and his associates earned roughly $11 million in undisclosed payments from ICO issuers that they hid from the investing public, according to the indictment.

 

 

My thoughts

[This is tech enough news, right?]

Call me old fashioned but I’ve always been suspicious of people who prompt stuff without disclosing it. Do you guys think this whole NFT stuff is real? Does it make sense to pay $$$ for “crypto” artwork? Or is it just people promoting it deceptively?  
 

Sources

www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/05/john-mcafee-charged-cryptocurrency/

[williamcll]

I mean he was already on the run before this.

[Action_Johnson]

Of course he was.

It's John McAfee....

 

 

[anonymousElefant]

I'm surprised he's still alive. Am I right that this is the guy who went from having all the money in the world to being publicly known as a sex addict and brawling with drug lords?

 

Also, people who place their financial wellbeing&strategy on tweets should maybe blame themselves for any losses. 

 

I hope I'm not alone in assuming that anyone promoting anything publicly is trying to gain something, if disclosed or not. 

[WolframaticAlpha]

5 hours ago, anonymousElefant said:

I'm surprised he's still alive. Am I right that this is the guy who went from having all the money in the world to being publicly known as a sex addict and brawling with drug lords?

 

Also, people who place their financial wellbeing&strategy on tweets should maybe blame themselves for any losses. 

 

I hope I'm not alone in assuming that anyone promoting anything publicly is trying to gain something, if disclosed or not.

He created the first scam, the McAfee antivirus. Now he promotes a second scam, crypto /s

[Heliian]

8 hours ago, Jet_ski said:

Do you guys think this whole NFT stuff is real? Does it make sense to pay $$$ for “crypto” artwork? Or is it just people promoting it deceptively?  

Just more money laundering and bs promoting.

 

 

[TetraSky]

Ah, so it's because he didn't properly disclose that what he was posting were ads and he was getting paid for them...

9 hours ago, Jet_ski said:

Do you guys think this whole NFT stuff is real

It is real in the sense that it "exist" and there's some people actually willing to buy into it, for some inexplicable reason.

But it's simply ridiculous and a terrible concept, even if you pretend play to own a "unique" piece, there's still thousand of copies out there on the internet. What are you gonna do, copyright claim everything?

[StDragon]

3 hours ago, WolframaticAlpha said:

He created the first scam, the McAfee antivirus. Now he promotes a second scam, crypto /s

As I recall McAfee was a legit antivirus solution back in the early days of him coding. But he's no longer part of the company. McAfee is just in name only, and the industry has changed considerably since then. I don't hold this agains him.

 

OTOH If he offers you bath salts, run!!!

[Giganthrax]

At this point, can the people who trust McAfee and invest money based on what he tells them really be considered victims? I mean, the guy is such a well-known crook there are actual documentaries about him on youtube.

[IceBoneBadger]

 

5 hours ago, WolframaticAlpha said:

He created the first scam, the McAfee antivirus. Now he promotes a second scam, crypto /s

All cryptocurrency seems like a scam to me. If the likes of McAfee and Jarule are promoting something, you know it's a scam. Whatever happened to charges that McAfee hired a hitman to kill his neighbor?

[DeScruff]

3 hours ago, StDragon said:

As I recall McAfee was a legit antivirus solution back in the early days of him coding. But he's no longer part of the company. McAfee is just in name only, and the industry has changed considerably since then. I don't hold this agains him.

 

OTOH If he offers you bath salts, run!!!

Correct, the Anti-virus when it started was legit. He learned about computer viruses early on back before they were malicious. Realized he had the knowledge on how to remove them, and started a 'Drive to the customer' Virus removal business (not too unlike Geek Squad). Created a program to help automate his job. Distributed that program on BBSes (Free for personal use, Pay for commercial use, and support.) - completely legit program.

... But then he started to see dollar signs. Depending on your definition of scam this is where it would start.
He was selling a legit product, but he was certainly exaggerating how dangerous viruses were by writing a book about it, then being a doomsayer on national TV, which increased sales. - After people started catching on, he left the company, and the program became worse and worse, further cementing this reputation.

 

Everything else about the man... Oh geeze. His whole life (before and after starting the anti-virus) reads like a hes been the main character in a TV show like Breaking Bad. To hear hes involved in fraud cyrptocurrency scheme does not surprise me in the least, its only the most logical outcome.