The MEXC crypto exchange observed a 200% quarter-over-quarter surge in fraudulent trading activity between January and March 2025, it said in its quarterly report.
According to the exchange, 80,057 organized fraud attempts from over 3,000 fraud syndicates were identified in Q1. The fraudulent activity included market manipulation, wash trading, and automated trading bots exploiting users through “unfair” trading execution.
MEXC said that the rise in fraud was most pronounced in India, with the exchange flagging nearly 27,000 accounts for suspicious activity, followed by the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) region and Indonesia, which had 6,404 and 5,603 accounts flagged, respectively.
Tracy Jin, chief operating officer at MEXC, said the fraudulent activity was fueled by a steady stream of unsuspecting victims funneled through social engineering scams. Jin added:
“While 2021 was marked by DeFi exploits, 2025 is increasingly characterized by socially engineered market manipulation. We have observed a growing number of so-called ‘educational’ trading groups that appear to be coordinated efforts to mislead users.”
A lack of education about cryptocurrencies and trading was the root cause of the increase in fraud, with many new users in these countries entering markets before understanding common scams and financial engineering pitfalls targeting crypto users, MEXC said.
The recent findings from the exchange highlight the need for education and awareness of common scams targeting crypto users to avoid falling prey to malicious actors.
Related: Industry exec sounds alarm on Ledger phishing letter delivered by USPS
Social engineering attacks amplify in the first half of 2025
In April 2025, onchain detective ZackXBT revealed incident details about an elderly individual who lost $330 million in Bitcoin (BTC) in a social engineering scam.
According to a later update from ZackXBT, the Binance Security team and other blockchain security firms helped freeze $7 million of the $330 million.
Crypto exchange Coinbase disclosed a data breach and subsequent ransom attempt, potentially impacting up to 70,000 customers of the exchange, in May 2025.
The threat actors made off with customer identification data, including names, addresses, and telephone numbers, but no private keys or user funds were compromised during the data breach.
However, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington warned that the data breach likely put investors in physical danger by revealing their contact information.
Magazine: Coinbase hack shows the law probably won’t protect you: Here’s why
