We Investigated Caslunya: Legit or Scam? The Facts

Recently, Caslunya.com website popped up, promoting itself as a platform where you can securely store cryptocurrency and other assets. I managed to gather credible supporting information that unmistakably indicates it is, in truth, a scam site.

Despite the promises of the most user-friendly, reliable, and customer-centric service, Caslunya.com does not follow any of them. All this is just a golden wrap around a blatant scam, which takes your money and data and never returns them. Any stories about bonuses, sponsorship from celebrities etc are absent as well.

Caslunya Scam Overview

Originally, Caslunya poses as a crypto trading & cryptowallet platform with outstandingly low commission fees. Another notable selling point for this platform is backing from celebrities that have relation to the crypto world. Vitalii Buterin (Ethereum creator), Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet – the site claims having significant support from them. To make these claims look more realistic, con actors use deepfake videos where those celebrities advertise the fraud as the best thing in the world. For known reasons, Elon Musk is the most common choise for that. But, as I said in the introduction, all this is just a vivid wrap around an obvious scam.

Caslunya Scam

First and foremost, Caslunya copies the design of many equivalent online platforms. There are quite a few examples, like Bravexer, Bitfinexup or Bitether. They are completely identical in terms of visual elements, with slight discrepancies in the webpage header. Other details, and at times even crypto wallet addresses, are identical. Probably, all these deceptive online platforms are led by a single gang of swindrels.

Cryptocurrency Scam Summary

How the Caslunya Scam Works?

Caslunya is a part of a large cryptocurrency scam scheme that started circulating actively in 2023. Rascals who stand behind it use numerous website designs, which still share the similar overall layout. Another shared element are the ways the scams like NAME are promoted, and the manner all this ends up to the victim of the scam. To reach peak efficiency, frauds apply advanced psychological tricks that make the user believe in the legitimacy of the website. But let’s review them one by one.

Step 1: Promotion

To initiate the fraud, criminals create and fill accounts on well-liked social media platforms. They generally focus on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. Subsequently, the promotional campaign commences. Using bots and sponsored ads (when possible), fraud actors boost the exposure of their fraudulent activities to possible victims. And as I said, fraudsters do not shy away using deepfake for creating clips with the mentioned celebs that advertise their scam to the public. To boost the folks even more, deceivers claim the bonus for every user who registers the service immediately.

Promotions of cryptoscams like Caslunya in TikTok. Most of these videos are AI-generated deepfakes

Users obtain an encouragement to register, attracted by the promise of obtaining cryptocurrency rewards valued at hundreds of dollars, all for free. To increase the attractiveness of the offer, false claims of sponsorship by a celebrity are incorporated. As you may guess, these assertions are entirely baseless.

Step 2: Gaining Traffic

After following the promos, users end up on a page filled with appealing offers. “Crypto starts with Caslunya”, “Your crypto savings are secured with Caslunya, “Start earning with Caslunya – they look rather credible. To heat up users and make them proceed to step 3, scammers say that obtaining the promised bonus requires registration. And as nothing concerning happens at this point, unaware users happily move on – especially as the gift appears to be right behind the corner.

This is the last stage when it is possible to skip the scam without any losses. Before you register using your personal info, swindrels will not be able to earn even a penny from your presence on the website.

Step 3: Data Gathering

This is the starting poing of the main fraud action. As I just mentioned, frauds bait folks for registration with bonuses. And all the personal info needed for it – username, email, cryptocurrency wallet address – are valuable for user identification. Solely by gathering this info and selling it further into the Darknet, swindlers can earn quite a penny. Nonetheless, their plans go much further.

As it turns out, you cannot use the promised bonus right away. To make at least crypto purchases on the platform with it, the user should top up the account with the equivalent sum. And this is what starts the final step of the scam.

Step 4: Requesting funds

Obviously, any cryptocurrency purchases require having funds on your account. With Caslunya, users are also compelled to top up to get the bonuses. And this is what creates the majority of the cash flow to this fraudulent website. By topping up the account, users hope to get the pledged gift (usually $500-1000 in USDT), and may start trading on this site hoping to use all the deposited money and withdraw them.

This is where the victim notices the problems. When comparing the actual crypto wallet vs what the website says, you can notice that no transactions are done whatsoever. And then, when you’d try to withdraw the money from your account, the scam is finally uncovered to the user.

Step 5: Escaping from Funds Withdrawal

Needless to say that swindlers are naught on intentions to give your money back. But to make the fraud look more realistic, they’ve elaborated a whole bunch of reasons to decline the transfer-out request. Usually, they repeat what Know Your Client requirements say, but in this case they are here exclusively to make the wireout impossible.

By asking for your personal information, frauds just stall hoping for you to accept the loss and stop contacting them. If you don’t – well, there are a dozen other checks you should go through before getting your grand back. And each of these checks will uncover more and more information, which – you guessed it right – will be then traded on the Darknet. Never reveal your real info to strangers!

Signs of Scam

I gathered several facts that point at the scammy nature of the Caslunya.com. Actually, there are a lot of scams that fall under the same points, so they are pretty much universal.

• Absent company details. Caslunya does not provide any documentation about its ownership, location or registration. No legitimate contact details are given either. Moreover, it appears that the domain and all social network pages were registered quite recently.
• Fake sponsorship from a celebrity. Scams like Caslunya like to pick a celebrity as a sponsor of this entire campaign. For obvious reasons, fraudsters generally choose Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mr. Beast, Mark Zuckerberg, and similar celebrities. They do not disdain claiming partnership with a company as well. Even though Coinbase, Binance or MetaMask never heard of Caslunya, they do not care – this creates a halo of credibility.
• Potential Ponzi Scheme. The scam relies on a Ponzi-like referral system to spread reach through social media. In fact, only the first members will receive the payoff, at the cost of the money brought by other members.
• Hype without facts. Frauds can cheer up their victims from time to time, using claims about non-existent events. “We got contracts with Coinbase”, “Elon Musk mentioned us as the most prolific crypto project” – you could likely hear something like that. This is made to make people believe in their money return. This can be the sauce to make people top-up their accounts once again.
• Crypto-only incoming payments. Whether the user tries to top-up the account, hackers will only accept payments in crypto – no bank transfers or other payment methods. Such an approach completely hides the identity of the company and deprives you of the ability to ask for a refund.
• Claims are too good to be true. Let’s be sane and sober: even in crypto space, there are not many places where you can earn 50-100-200%. Being able to participate in all of them is nearly impossible, as well as it is impossible to insure or hedge all the risks. Even by that reason alone I can tell that the Caslunya is a definite scam.

What Should I do as a Victim?

If you had to deal with Caslunya site and fell victim to that scam, there are still some steps to take. They will make further scam attempts harder, and also boost the knowledge about that scam among folks.

• Report the scam to authorities. Search for local authorities responsible for financial frauds, and also notify wallet providers and social networks via their tech support. It is essential to make the further operations of these scammers much harder.
• Tell your close friends. That step is similar to reporting to the authorities, and has similar effects. By posting info about scam crypto service, you decrease the pool of people they can fool.
• Get evidence. Screenshot or save all the information related to the website. URL, screenshot of a main page, login window, EULA, account top-up menu, wallet addresses – all these things may be useful for authorities to find the scammers.
• Check whether you can ask for a refund. As I’ve said above, crypto payments do not fall under refund policies in most banks. Nonetheless, in some circumstances, it is still possible. Never lose hope until you actually confirm it is gone.
• Make your mistake your lesson. Financial losses are always a reason for frustration, but let’s imagine it was a pay for scam revealing courses. Remember the key features of these crypto scam sites, the way they attract people and what they promise. In the future, you will easily recognize a trap of spending no money.

Scan your system for possible malware infections

Beware of cross scams! Scam actors can use your trust to make you download some stuff or interact with certain documents. It may be a trap that installs malware to your system. There are no moral barriers or limits for these scoundrels.

Throughout the course of the fraud, rascals may get in touch with you with particular files. Alternatively, they may offer you to deploy “cryptocurrency wallet applications” or “browser extensions” to simplify access to your cryptocurrency assets. As we previously figured out, these scoundrels have no intent of giving back your funds. So, what can these emails and browser plugins represent? Correct – that is another side of the deceptive plan designed to entice you into deliberately running destructive applications onto your system.

Both plugins and files attached to email messages can act as a shell for various malicious code. In this case, I expect the presence of spyware and stealers among all types of malware. While it is not obligatory for scammers to distribute malware, the probability is always above zero. As stated, their conscience is of little concern, and their dignity is already severely tarnished. They have no principles to lose and aim to maximize gains.

Frequently asked questions